Of School Lunch, Farm Bills, Free Riders, and Book Clubs

Jennifer Worrel

Jennifer Worrel is a transplant from the Great Plains raising two sons and a husband in Metro Atlanta. Extremely likable until you get to know her, she remains a great invite to a dinner party. She prefers peeing in the woods to peeing on private planes and was once told by her husband that she is “way funnier online.” Writes about whatever interests her, she knows a little about a lot. For fun, she enjoys cooking from scratch and watching old Milton Friedman videos on YouTube. Jennifer's thoughts are her own and do not represent the views or position of any firm or affiliate she is lucky enough to associate with.

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226 Responses

  1. Oscar Gordon says:

    We did the food pickup for quite a while as well, and I’m not in a low-cost area.Report

  2. fillyjonk says:

    Reminds me of how one of my grandmothers (a widow living on VERY limited social security, and while family members helped where they could, most of her older children were in a similar boat to her) used to get the “government cheese.”

    Except. My grandmother was probably lactose-intolerant; she said milk and cheese and ice cream upset her stomach. But she took the cheese anyway; it was easier to accept it along with the macaroni and flour and whatever else was being handed out than to refuse. And she parcelled it out to other people, who wouldn’t have strictly been eligible for the handouts, including my family. It made good grilled cheese sandwiches, I’ll say that much. It was more welcome in my family than baby carrots would have been that’s for sure.Report

  3. Chip Daniels says:

    This is what I was referring to, when I heard a left wing activist on NPR reminiscing about how during the Cold War, you could get nearly any social welfare program passed, provided you could frame it as “national security”.

    So a proposal to feed hungry poor children? Nope, we can’t afford it.

    A proposal to feed young potential soldiers and benefit farm interests? We can’t afford not to!Report

    • rexknobus in reply to Chip Daniels says:

      A while ago I did gene maps for a major university researcher who was working on a relatively rare disease caused by a disorder in chromosome 11. Somewhere along the line the researcher found that victims of that syndrome had a higher resistance to radiation poisoning. From that moment on, funding from the DoD was guaranteed. Mixed feelings: glad the research was being done; sorry I lived in a place where only that circumstance could get the necessary funding.Report

  4. DensityDuck says:

    see also: stories from 2020 (and occasionally since) about airlines flying empty planes around, usually with “CAPITALISM!” or “the lovely free market, so efficient” as the lead-in tweet, making no mention of the fact that airport gate rights are given out by the government, and that if you don’t use them they are taken away and given to another airline.Report

    • The “ghost flights” controversy is about take-off/landing slots for runways, not gate rights. Flying between capacity constrained airports, an airline needs a take-off slot at one and a landing slot at an appropriate later time at the destination, possibly in a different country. Government is involved because international coordination is required.Report

      • Philip H in reply to Michael Cain says:

        What I find ironic about this is that airlines EXPECT that the FAA will build and expand runways and terminal capacities as the airlines dictate . . . . without any skin in the game themselves, and then complain mightily when the FAA doesn’t do their needs in full at XX airport. Which, if we were running the airlines as an actual market would not be the case . . .Report

        • Oscar Gordon in reply to Philip H says:

          I thought expanding capacity at an airport was on whatever local port authority was responsible for the airport, not the FAA. The FAA approves expansions, but isn’t actually managing those expansions.Report

          • Philip H in reply to Oscar Gordon says:

            Most of those projects are undertaken with federal funds.Report

          • Philip H in reply to Oscar Gordon says:

            Funding for the program is provided from the Airport and Airway Trust Fund, which receives revenue from taxes on airplane tickets sold to the public and a tax on aviation fuel. The federal grant may cover between 75 and 95 percent of the eligible costs, depending on the type of improvement and the size of the airport.

            https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airport_Improvement_ProgramReport

            • Oscar Gordon in reply to Philip H says:

              Right, but the FAA isn’t showing up to O’Hare and telling them to add 20 more gates and a new runway. Airlines negotiate with the port authority and the FAA to add additional capacity, and the FAA says yea or nay and hands out whatever funds it deems fit, but it’s a regulatory agency, not the Army Corps of Engineers. It’s not building that capacity. So saying:

              …EXPECT that the FAA will build and expand runways and terminal capacities as the airlines dictate…

              Isn’t accurate.

              They may expect the FAA to approve and partially fund such expansions when the airlines make a sufficient case for it (& have local buy-in), but they don’t expect the FAA to build anything.Report

  5. Saul Degraw says:

    The fact that people get bugged out by “free riders” has always perplexed me. I would rather have false positives in a system than false negatives. I.e. maybe a person on SSDI or some other form of aid/charity does not really need it but it seems morally preferable to allow the coasters than to deny to people who really need help out of a fear of moochers.Report

    • Oscar Gordon in reply to Saul Degraw says:

      It’s the secret fear that if you tolerate the moochers, the moochers will soon outnumber the producers. It’s basically admitting that your society either A) lacks the ability to instill a work ethic, and/or B) that your society is bad at creating the incentives to work.Report

      • Saul Degraw in reply to Oscar Gordon says:

        The work ethic is largely overrated. I like my job but I do not want it to be the defining aspect of my personality or what people know me for. Perhaps this is weird but I would rather be known for my kindness, my sense of humor, my knowledge on culture, history, and politics, etc., over the fact that I am a lawyer/professional.

        That secret fear needs to be gotten over and the sooner the better.Report

        • Oscar Gordon in reply to Saul Degraw says:

          A work ethic is good in that you should do the work your are being incentivized (read: paid) to do. A work ethic that encourages doing extra without compensation or rock solid promise of future benefits, is just a scam perpetuated by people who suck at incentivizing work.Report

      • Philip H in reply to Oscar Gordon says:

        < blockquote>It’s the secret fear that if you tolerate the moochers, the moochers will soon outnumber the producers.

        Given the number of politicians who have talked openly about this the last 20 or so years I doubt its still secret.

        It’s basically admitting that your society either A) lacks the ability to instill a work ethic, and/or B) that your society is bad at creating the incentives to work.

        This is not true, at least not based on data. If anything, the data points to very much the opposite conclusion when people are given actual support.

        That secret fear needs to be gotten over and the sooner the better.

        As more and more parts of the economy become automated, and thus people aren’t needed, this fear will come to haunt us. We will, at some point, need to provide people with economic support that’s work independent.Report

        • fillyjonk in reply to Philip H says:

          “if you tolerate the moochers, the moochers will soon outnumber the producers.Given the number of politicians who have talked openly about this the last 20 or so years I doubt its still secret.”

          A friend of mine comments that we express the loudest abhorrence of behaviors we ourselves either indulge in, or are tempted to indulge in…..interesting.Report

          • Oscar Gordon in reply to fillyjonk says:

            See also: Homophobes who are getting some on the sideReport

          • Pinky in reply to fillyjonk says:

            I don’t think that’s true. We complain about things that disgust us. Something may disgust us because we see something about ourselves in it, but it can also just disgust us. My dad wasn’t suppressing anti-patriotic feelings when he’d talk about respecting the flag.

            The big problem I have with your friend’s comment is that it undercuts a person’s position in an argument based on their fervor. If you really do hate people stealing food from the hungry, you better not say anything against it, or someone might accuse you of indulging in it. That’s not fair.Report

      • LeeEsq in reply to Oscar Gordon says:

        Social democracy seems to function the best when most people believe that the other citizens won’t slack off and leave them to do everything.Report

    • JS in reply to Saul Degraw says:

      I see that a lot here in Texas, generally about school taxes with “I don’t even have kids”.

      Yes, but you were one once.

      In any case, it’s mostly conservatives struggling to understand Texas is actually a high-tax, low service state — sales and property taxes eat more from their budget than an income tax would, and don’t even get me started on how that leads to education funding disparities — so bad even the Texas Supreme Court had to get involved, which is why some of my property taxes go to a paired school district across Texas. One that is still heartbreakingly poor.Report

    • Pinky in reply to Saul Degraw says:

      Do you mean bothered you or actually perplexed you?Report

    • Chip Daniels in reply to Saul Degraw says:

      The Free Rider argument is, in my experience almost always a bad faith proxy for People I Don’t Like.

      Like, you show a clip of a single mom buying a candy bar with SNAP and the outrage machine goes into high gear, but a documented case of military WastenFraud gets crickets.

      It’s never about the money it’s about the parties involved.Report

      • Jaybird in reply to Chip Daniels says:

        The thing that you have to overcome is that there is a perception of “the deserving poor” versus “the undeserving poor”.

        “They shouldn’t feel that way!” does not, in fact, overcome it.

        “They’re *BAD* for feeling that way!” also does not, in fact, overcome it.

        For a lot of folks, welfare *WAS* the compromise. And part of that is the whole “okay, we want this money to go to help kids instead of buying cigarettes for the parents” is stuff like “means-testing”. “Maybe the parents should be buying formula instead of smokes… okay, we’ll make a program where they get vouchers that are good for formula but not good for smokes.”

        And that wasn’t the goal. That was the compromise.

        (Honestly, I think if the Democrats ran on “Afghanistan was a 20 year program of WastenFraud”, they could do some damage in some swing districts. Maybe even some light red ones.)Report

        • Chip Daniels in reply to Jaybird says:

          I’m not interested in “overcoming it” whatever that means.

          I’m just pointing it out. What people make of it is up to them.Report

          • Jaybird in reply to Chip Daniels says:

            “Overcoming it”, in my reading, would be stuff like “expanding it” or “giving more stuff” or “giving stuff to more people” or stuff like that.

            If that’s not your goal, hey. Good news for the opposition.Report

            • Philip H in reply to Jaybird says:

              At least you are willing to concede that some folks think other folks deserve to be poor.Report

              • DensityDuck in reply to Philip H says:

                (I guess you missed his posts about Dubai)Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Philip H says:

                When I slip into that headspace, it’s more of a “it follows that” than a “deserve”.

                Does Person F “deserve” to be overweight?
                Well, if Person F eats $48 worth of Sonic Drive Thru every day and the only exercise they get is when they strain during a bathroom break, I don’t think that they’d say “Person F *DESERVES* to be fat!” as much as “there are things that follow from other things and ‘deserve’ does not enter into it.”

                So, too, for socio-economic status.Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Jaybird says:

                Arnold Himself has a relevant quotation:

                “A well build physique is a status symbol. It reflects you worked hard for it. No money can buy it, you cannot borrow it, you cannot inherit it, you cannot steal it. You cannot hold onto it without constant work. It shows discipline, it shows self-respect, it shows patience, work ethic, and passion. That is why I do what I do.”

                Perhaps there are people out there who are overweight that do not “deserve” to be overweight. Heck, if you do a comparison of “most overweight states, 1990” to “most overweight states, 2022”, you’ll be shocked and you may even see a systemic problem rather than issues related to individual vice. Sure.

                But saying “they don’t *DESERVE* to be fat” seems weird. I’m sure they don’t. Nobody does.

                But some things follow other things.Report

              • Philip H in reply to Jaybird says:

                There are conservatives, aligned with the Republican party, who believe, write, and say that poor people deserve to be poor because they live immoral lives and make nothing but bad choices. It’s not even close to whether someone deserves to be obese.Report

              • Chip Daniels in reply to Philip H says:

                Jay’s right.

                Being a poor child just naturally follows from being born to a poor family.

                Pretty obvious really.

                It’s only the affluent elite liberals who are out of touch with the working poor who don’t grasp this.Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Philip H says:

                Well, that’s not a headspace that I’m in. I’m more of a “things follow other things” guy.

                I mean, read about this school: Check this out.

                Are you surprised that a kid who goes to this school will end up unlikely to get an awesome job? I’m not. But the school is an absolute failure.

                There are a lot of “deserve” questions you could ask. Does a kid who graduates from this school without functional literacy “deserve” to graduate? Does a graduate of this school “deserve” a high paying job somewhere?

                Or we could back up: Do the kids “deserve” to go to a school incapable of teaching A SINGLE KID?

                Do the schools deserve to be destroyed and rebuilt?

                There are a lot of things that follow from other things. I suppose we could try to prevent some of those things that follow but I haven’t seen good ways of doing that… not ways that don’t also build up tons and tons of technical debt.Report

              • Philip H in reply to Jaybird says:

                There are conservatives, aligned with the Republican party, who believe, write, and say that poor people deserve to be poor because they live immoral lives and make nothing but bad choices. They use this as justification to try and slash or eliminate public services to the poor.

                Is that better? Does that get at your things flowing from other things headspace?Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Philip H says:

                The comparison that comes quickest is the whole vaccine thing. Do people who refuse to get the Moderna or Pfizer deserve to die of the Covid?

                There’s probably a handful of people out there yelling stuff like “HERMAN CAIN AWARD!” and arguing that they do deserve to die but I imagine that the people here are far more circumspect and would, instead, argue that, hey, it’s unfortunate but some things follow other things and there’s a lot of data out there and it pretty much all points in one direction.

                Get the shot.Report

              • Swami in reply to Jaybird says:

                “Do the schools deserve to be destroyed and rebuilt?”

                Yes, everybody associated with this type of failure needs to be encouraged or forced to change professions.

                The response I see from responsible adults on all sides of the political spectrum are to flee as far as possible from these school districts. Some do it by buying in a different community, some by sending kids to private schools, some by home schooling, some to boarding and Montessori schools.

                The last question I have is do the kids born to the parents that put up with this deserve better parents?Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Swami says:

                At some point “deserve” seems to be a silly concept.

                Use every man after his desert, and something something.

                We need to figure out the best ways to create self-replicating machines that are good at creating self-replicating machines that are good at creating self-replicating machines and so on. (Not that I’m one to talk.)Report

      • Swami in reply to Chip Daniels says:

        The free rider argument is a recognition that cooperation within groups is undermined if people are allowed to maximize their share of collective benefits while minimizing their share of collective costs. The argument has been well developed in game theory and evolutionary biology to explain why wide scale cooperation is so rare among non related individuals of most species (the exceptions do in this case prove the rule).

        There are various human solutions to the dilemma of cooperation, one of the most important has been to establish reputations and allow people to freely associate and cooperate based upon mutual choice. This is the model closest to free markets and is also what is observed in forager societies. Another is the top down model where the alphas (aka stationary bandits), require (aka force) the level of contribution and benefit collection. This model is closer to that of Marxism. Both pure models have their limitations and weaknesses.

        What is unsustainable is to allow guaranteed benefits without contributions for those that are able. This creates a dynamic where the productive are exploited by the unproductive. It becomes more expensive to be a sucker over time, and the group dynamic shifts as fewer choose to contribute labor, effort, creativity, investment and risk and more choose to free tide, until the system either corrects course or collapses. See the rapidly escalating stats on young healthy males dropping out of the workforce for an example.

        Yes, I am offended by free riding welfare recipients and so called disability claimants who avoid work. Guilty as charged. I am also offended by overpriced exploitative defense contractors and inefficient bureaucracy. I would diagnose the problems and solutions as being different though.Report

        • Philip H in reply to Swami says:

          See the rapidly escalating stats on young healthy males dropping out of the workforce for an example.

          I’d love to see those stats for the US. So far I think they are a myth.

          I am offended by free riding welfare recipients and so called disability claimants who avoid work.

          I would be too if such people were the norm. They are not. Welfare recipients have been required by the federal government to work since 1996. States rigorously enforce this. And fraudulent disability recipients are, in fact, routinely caught and prosecuted. but they are a tiny fraction of claimants, and really shouldn’t be held against the rest of the recipients, even though they clearly are.Report

          • Swami in reply to Philip H says:

            “I’d love to see those stats for the US”

            Odd, I have been reading about this escalating trend for over a decade. Here is just one place to start, but if you Google it you can find hundreds more.

            https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-06-11/fewer-young-men-are-in-the-labor-force-more-are-living-at-home

            You might also Google disability trends for males.

            The 1996 law was a great improvement.Report

            • Greg In Ak in reply to Swami says:

              Citing an article from the middle of Covid may not be the best evidence. There are trends but covid was a thing. Questions about disability are good but to make a point about free riders you need to actually know how many are disabled instead of FRing.Report

              • Swami in reply to Greg In Ak says:

                I am not going to Google everything for you guys. The increase in disability claims and the trends of NILF, especially for young males, has been a pattern discussed in economics news for a decade now. The consensus, from memory is that we’ve seen roughly a doubling of young men who have dropped out of the work force. Some to school, some to disability which has gone up dramatically, some to their parents’ basement to play video games.

                And yes, I know some of these people, and believe it qualifies as a problem, though it is certainly not just “free riding.”Report

              • Philip H in reply to Swami says:

                But that article says zero, absolutely zero, about people willingly staying out of the workforce BECAUSE of government incentives. Parental incentives perhaps, but not governmental ones.

                Report

            • Philip H in reply to Swami says:

              Two things stand out for me form that article – firs is that video game playing is alluded to as a barrier. That’s an old conservative trope going back well into the 1980’s that’s not backed up by a shred of evidence.

              The other thing that I notice is the strong correlation with pain killer use . . . But that article says zero, absolutely zero, about people willingly staying out of the workforce BECAUSE of government incentives. Parental incentives perhaps, but not governmental ones.Report

              • Swami in reply to Philip H says:

                The video game trope is backed up with surveys of people out of labor force.

                “To go by the time-use surveys, prime-age men without work who are not looking for jobs and not engaged in training spend almost three times as many hours in front of screens as working women and well over twice as many as working men.3 Strikingly, they also report over 300 hours more screen time per year than their unemployed counterparts—men likewise jobless but who want to get back to work. And the reality is even more disturbing than these time-use numbers can convey on their own. According to a 2017 study by Alan Krueger, almost half of NILF men reported taking some form of pain medication every day.”

                https://www.aei.org/articles/what-do-prime-age-nilf-men-do-all-day/

                I agree it is not entirely due to government incentives.Report

        • Chip Daniels in reply to Swami says:

          Rather than hand waving about free riders it would be better to document actual cases.

          It seems weird to me how whenever we talk about a UBI one objection seems to be that people will double dip, i.e., getting the benefit but working on the sly.

          Or how people who inherit money usually keep working even when they don’t have to.

          Or how the most common theme in literature, across all human history and culture is that people never, ever, just loaf, but are endlessly ambitious and greedy even to their destruction.

          A wave of lazy loafers? I’m just not seeing it.Report

          • Brandon Berg in reply to Chip Daniels says:

            Sure, I’ll go first. Several years ago, I quit my job for a combination of personal/family reasons and just really not liking that job in particular.

            I had plans. I was going to make good use of my time off. I was going to learn new things, work on cool projects, and go places.

            I kind of did those things, but far less than I had hoped. I also wasted a ton of time playing games and arguing with dumbasses on the Internet. Somehow I actually cut back on my leisure-time exercise and social activities.

            After a year or so, I realized that it wasn’t working out, and decided to go back to work. I then spent several more months procrastinating on updating my resume so that I could apply for jobs. All in all, I was out of the labor force for the better part of two years, and had very little to show for it.

            For the record, this was entirely self-funded from savings. I didn’t get or apply for unemployment or any kind of means-tested benefits from the government.

            I’ve also had a couple of friends who took years to get jobs after school. And they spent a lot of that time playing games and screwing around on the Internet. Why? Because their parents enabled it. It was the path of least resistance. If it’s not implied by “friends,” I want to make it clear that I do like them. I still think it’s bad, for them and for society, that their parents enabled their free riding.

            Yes, there are people who would have made better use of this time than I did. But until then, I had thought that I was one of them. It’s easy to fantasize about all the things you would do if you didn’t have to work, until you actually have the opportunity.

            It’s not that everyone aspires to just mooch off taxpayers for their whole lives. It’s just that it’s really easy to stay on the path of least resistance, especially if you know that the government will always have your back, without getting on your back about finding a job.

            The possibility that really worries me is that after graduating or dropping out, living off the NEETBux for a few years might become a totally normal, socially acceptable thing you can do, and nobody will judge you for it. We need to be mindful of how policies affect the path of least resistance, because a lot of people will stay on that path for a long time.Report

            • Philip H in reply to Brandon Berg says:

              Neither you nor your friends were living off government assistance. Its not actually the same thing.Report

              • Brandon Berg in reply to Philip H says:

                No two things are ever the same. Why do you think this difference is important enough to invalidate the broader point? If anything, the fact that I was drawing down my savings instead of free riding increased my incentive to go back to work ASAP.Report

              • InMD in reply to Brandon Berg says:

                You don’t think there are enormous differences between people qualifying for public assistance and people wealthy enough to take extended sabbaticals for themselves?Report

              • Oscar Gordon in reply to InMD says:

                Don’t look at the funding sources, look at the incentives.

                If your basic needs are met from funds you don’t earn directly, what is your incentive to earn more funds?

                Doesn’t matter if the money comes from savings, family, a spouse, or welfare.Report

              • If your basic needs are met from funds you don’t earn directly, what is your incentive to earn more funds?

                Many people want more than basic needs. They want a house, not an apartment. They want a house near downtown, and to go to the trendy clubs. They want a car, not public transportation. They want a fancier car. They want 500 cable channels, and streaming video, and a PS5.Report

              • Oscar Gordon in reply to Michael Cain says:

                Exactly, which means there’s an incentive inherent in humans to acquire luxury.

                But there’s another set of incentives as well, which is to not be abused or taken advantage of. This is part of what is driving the churn in the labor market right now.

                What disturbs me is that business owners/leaders seem to be confusing employees wanting more money as greed, rather than an a$$hole management tax.Report

              • Philip H in reply to Oscar Gordon says:

                What disturbs me is that business owners/leaders seem to be confusing employees wanting more money as greed, rather than an a$$hole management tax.

                Really? You are disturbed that businesses can’t grok employees acting in the exact same manor as c-suiters have for decades? Really?Report

              • Oscar Gordon in reply to Philip H says:

                Yeah, it does, because it suggests a level of willful ignorance that boggles the mind. Right up there with people deciding they are capable of grokking vaccine safety trials without a background in stats or biology.

                Is it surprising? No, because this is the world we live in. Is it disturbing? Yes, yes it is.Report

              • Philip H in reply to Oscar Gordon says:

                The C Suite types aren’t willfully ignorant. They know full well they have under compensated labor for its contribution to corporate growth, sometimes for decades. They knew exactly what they were doing, and they have now been caught in their own webs. What’s more disturbing to me is the long standing pattern of undercompensating labor and lying about it.Report

              • Dark Matter in reply to Philip H says:

                The market sets pay, not the C Suite.

                Amazon didn’t raise their pay because they wanted to look good, they did so because they had to.

                The pandemic and it’s fall out may have increased labor rates. What we’re seeing now is companies fight for employees.

                This is a good thing and what we want.

                Many gov interventions come down to “the gov will destroy bad jobs” which isn’t the same thing as creating good jobs.Report

              • Oscar Gordon in reply to Dark Matter says:

                No, the C-suite sets the pay, then works very hard to convince the market (read: candidates & current employees) that the market is setting the price of labor (often through tactics like actively discouraging employees from discussing pay & compensation levels, so the information disparity remains in their favor).

                The best part about the current labor disenchantment is that candidates are being much more aggressive about not only negotiating for compensation, but turning down opportunities where the corporate cultural isn’t appealing. This is something that has been long overdue in the US labor market.Report

              • Pinky in reply to Oscar Gordon says:

                It’s also worth noting that for many people on aid, working harder will reduce their income. The first, say, $5K in earnings may reduce their support by $10K. That’s always the risk with indefinite governmental support.Report

              • Philip H in reply to Pinky says:

                It’s also worth noting that for many people on aid, working harder will reduce their income.

                This is indeed true, and its one of the only policy failings in this arena by the government.Report

              • Philip H in reply to Brandon Berg says:

                I see it as wildly inaccurate to try and construct an argument about free riders on government programs with two examples of people who aren’t free riders on government programs. With substantial savings – or substantial parental support – you weren’t actually incentivized the same way a person on welfare would be.Report

            • DensityDuck in reply to Brandon Berg says:

              “The possibility that really worries me is that after graduating or dropping out, living off the NEETBux for a few years might become a totally normal, socially acceptable thing you can do, and nobody will judge you for it.”

              …and?

              You’re not really explaining why that’s bad.

              I agree that it is, but I think you need to show your work here.Report

          • DensityDuck in reply to Chip Daniels says:

            “Rather than hand waving about free riders it would be better to document actual cases.”

            why, so you can sniff about Strapping Young Bucks again?Report

          • Swami in reply to Chip Daniels says:

            You were the one who started hand waving about “always being a bad faith proxy for people I don’t like.” My response was that the free rider problem is the central dilemma of cooperation and has been elevated to one of the hardest to explain aspects of successful societies.

            There is decades of research on the issue in game theory, libraries of books on the issue in evolutionary biology and extensive literature on foragers (start with Boehm). In history, we have extensive literature on the collapse of various communes which did not require work (and didn’t get any), and the spotty record of communism and how it got around the problem with gulags and forced work.

            You were hand waving the problem away. I am stating that it is ever present as an issue, and critical to the success of any society.Report

      • Pinky in reply to Chip Daniels says:

        “The Free Rider argument is, in my experience almost always a bad faith proxy for People I Don’t Like.”

        That relieves you of ever having to consider the other guy’s position. It’s something like conspiracy theory thinking, in a way. The existence of evidence against your opinions is proof of them.Report

        • Philip H in reply to Pinky says:

          we consider the other guy’s opinion. it generally fails for two reasons – lack of actual data to back it up (except extreme edge cases in very small numbers) and it also flies in the face of he values the other guy claims for himself. Align those three things better and we can have a great discussion.Report

          • Pinky in reply to Philip H says:

            Have you ever talked to, say, me? I don’t want unnecessary government aid going to people I like or people I don’t. As for the data, the free rider problem is a well-studied economic phenomenon. I don’t have data regarding school lunches, and I’m guessing neither do you. So where are these insurmountable inconsistencies? For that matter, did Density, Dark, or Jennifer present any?Report

            • Chip Daniels in reply to Pinky says:

              We know what abuse of government aid gets criticized and is subject to stringent requirements, and which abuse of government aid isn’t.

              This has been well documented for decades.

              It demonstrates which groups are liked and which groups are not.Report

              • Pinky in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                That’s nothing but confirmation bias on your part. The answer can’t always be “I have observed this all my life and anyone who remembers differently is wrong”. Just, reasonably, if you say that more than once a day you should reconsider your thinking, but it seems to be the core of a ton of your arguments.Report

              • Chip Daniels in reply to Pinky says:

                You tell me.
                Or better yet, tell everyone here, and see how persuasive you can be.

                Which is more likely to anger American voters, abuse of SNAP or abuse of military contracting?Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                Abuse of SNAP seems to have a long history of angering American voters (even among users of SNAP, ironically enough).

                Doesn’t this demonstrate that he’s right, though?Report

              • Pinky in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                Depends on the party. As someone who cares about the poor and a strong military, I hate to see either of them getting ripped off. But generally speaking, more conservative people will worry about the SNAP budget and more liberal people will worry about the military budget. Generally, I’d guess that rich con men are more hated than middle-poor con men. On the other hand, stealing food is more visceral than a debate about the F-22 versus the F-35.Report

              • Philip H in reply to Pinky says:

                Abuse of SNAP seems to have a long history of angering American voters (even among users of SNAP, ironically enough).

                But generally speaking, more conservative people will worry about the SNAP budget and more liberal people will worry about the military budget.

                SNAP has a documented fraud rate of 0.9 to 1%. Is that good? Probably not. Could we get it lower? Probably not. All the documented instances I can find of prosecutions are for trading benefits for cash, not getting benefits you aren’t entitled to. My conclusion is that SNAP fraud, much like in person voting fraud, is a myth in search of a constituency.

                Defense fraud is much harder to find statistics on. DoD IG runs roughly 20% of its investigations on contracting fraud. How much that translates into dollar wise or percent wise is not something I can run down.

                I’d guess that rich con men are more hated than middle-poor con men. On the other hand, stealing food is more visceral than a debate about the F-22 versus the F-35.

                This is certainly true, at least based on the vitriol heaped on “welfare queens” by politicians and pundits. Unfortunately its based on a lie whose perpetuation is pernicious.Report

              • Chip Daniels in reply to Pinky says:

                What if I told you Neo, that abuse of military contracting IS stealing food?

                That every gun that is made signifies a theft from those who hunger and are not fed.Report

              • Philip H in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                You’d sound an awful lot like Eisenhower.Report

              • Pinky in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                The US defense budget permits the world’s free trade; the world’s free trade creates domestic wealth; domestic wealth funds our charity. Every properly spent dollar of the budget provides good; every wasted dollar constitutes a failure.Report

              • InMD in reply to Pinky says:

                I think that may be true about patrols and garrisons in the Pacific and Indian oceans and to a lesser degree NATO garrisons. Not sure it is for any number of ongoing low intensity conflict/counter terrorism operations we are involved in.Report

              • Pinky in reply to InMD says:

                I wouldn’t say that free trade is the goal of the US defense, but the way it’s worked out, free trade is a byproduct.Report

              • InMD in reply to Pinky says:

                Sure, though that walks kind of right into the question of what is the goal? Could any of it be better spent?

                I try to be pragmatic about these things and would not expect a utopia. But I do have to think that there may be some better uses at home for whatever we’ve spent half trying to overthrow Bashar al-Assad or standing up bases in Niger. And that’s not even the big ticket nation building stuff.Report

              • Philip H in reply to Pinky says:

                And from inside government, wasted dollars – at least to politicians – are dollars spent on something they don’t like. The merits of the expenditure are pointless in that debate.Report

              • Dark Matter in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                That every gun that is made signifies a theft from those who hunger and are not fed

                False choice.

                The US produces so much food that half of it is wasted. We give it away and pay farmers to not farm.

                The number of people who starved last year was roughly zero.

                Eliminate the entire military and the amount of food wouldn’t increase nor would more food end up in the hands of whoever.

                Whatever problems we have, “not enough food” isn’t one of them nor is “not enough money for food”.Report

              • Chip Daniels in reply to Dark Matter says:

                If that’s the case, free riders aren’t worth bothering about because hey, we’re so rich we’re throwing stuff away!Report

              • Oscar Gordon in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                I remember outrage over $10k hammers/toilet seats.

                Seems to me that the problem is one of narrative. Welfare cheats are committing fraud, military procurement is following the law.

                Folks just forget that the people following the law are the same ones helping to write those laws, while folks on welfare don’t really get to have an input into the law.Report

    • DensityDuck in reply to Saul Degraw says:

      “The fact that people get bugged out by “free riders” has always perplexed me. ”

      People bugged out about “the rich” getting COVID Stimulus payments, so, not really a surprise that people would bug out about The Undeserving?Report

      • Jaybird in reply to DensityDuck says:

        Going back to the airline bailouts, I’m pretty sure that if the airlines took the money and, instead of doing a stock buyback, paid employees to stay home (including paying *CONTRACTORS* to stay home) and maybe paid a fine or two to keep this or that runway space available in the future (even though it wasn’t being used right now), people would be saying “Yes. That’s what the bailout was for.”

        As it is, they laid people off.

        Next time something like this happens and there are calls for a bailout… we’re going to hear that the airlines don’t “deserve” a bailout. “Why?”, I can imagine someone asking in response. “Because all they’re going to do with it is do another round of layoffs and stock buybacks.”

        It’s easy to think that some people don’t deserve that check from the gummint.Report

        • Philip H in reply to Jaybird says:

          Based on the experience of the financial sector before the Great Recession, no airlines didn’t “deserve” bailouts. We knew what corporate airline behavior would be; and we were largely right.Report

          • Jaybird in reply to Philip H says:

            See? The concept of deserving vs undeserving has been hammered down quite flat.Report

            • Philip H in reply to Jaybird says:

              Airlines are not, contra the supreme court, people. They are businesses. Businesses flush with cash before covid, who prioritized paying higher and higher dividends and higher and higher CEO salaries over paying employees and even in some instances modernizing their fleets. They did that because of internal business decisions not government regulation. When COVID hit they stuck out their hands in order to keep their profit margins up, not to survive. Even when they were told their “help” was conditional on keeping employees on the payroll, they prioritized paying dividends over people. In other words they did not actually want to operate in a regulation free, government agnostic free market. They wanted American tax payers to keep them from reckoning with their decisions.

              Individual people deserve to receive aid because they are people. They are humans. their mere existence imputes dignity, regardless of their decisions. They deserve assistance, they deserve not being poor, simply because they are.

              Its nowhere near the same thing.Report

              • DensityDuck in reply to Philip H says:

                oh look it’s someone bugging out about “the rich” getting COVID Stimulus paymentsReport

              • Philip H in reply to DensityDuck says:

                Airlines aren’t people. They are companies. They made decision in an ostensibly free market. They didn’t and don’t deserve taxpayer support. I said so at the time and say so now.Report

              • DensityDuck in reply to Philip H says:

                “They made decision in an ostensibly free market.”

                it’s funny how you think airlines are a free marketReport

              • Philip H in reply to DensityDuck says:

                I don’t:

                In other words they did not actually want to operate in a regulation free, government agnostic free market. They wanted American tax payers to keep them from reckoning with their decisions.

                They want the federal government to shoulder their infrastructure burden through FAA funding for airport construction; they want federal bailouts which they can spend bulking up their stock prices and they want federal no fly bans on unruly passengers.

                But as an industry segment, they don’t want to be seen wanting these things. Because if they are seen wanting these things, government might impose thing son them for the greater social and economic good. They want to cloak themselves in the myth of the free market while operating in a captive regulatory environment.Report

    • Dark Matter in reply to Saul Degraw says:

      The fact that people get bugged out by “free riders” has always perplexed me.

      It’s an instinct. One of our basic instincts that allows society to function.

      Human level of cooperation among non-family members is scary high by animal standards. This instinct, i.e. free riders should be punished, is the big difference.Report

  6. Kazzy says:

    Re: free rider

    Is there a difference between “Free riding is bad and we should avoid it when possible” and “Free riding is back so kill the program entirely”?Report

    • Jaybird in reply to Kazzy says:

      I think it has to do with something like this:

      “Free riding is bad and we should avoid it when possible.”
      “I agree.”
      “We should disincentivize free riding.”
      “I don’t know…”
      “We should punish it. Maybe with criminal charges.”
      “Oh, absolutely not!”
      “We should shame it. Make people feel bad for doing it.”
      “Oh, absolutely not!”
      “We should make people take training. Training that explains why free riding is bad.”
      “I don’t think so.”
      “We should kill the program entirely.”
      “ISN’T THERE A MIDDLE GROUND SOMEWHERE?!?!?”Report

      • Pinky in reply to Jaybird says:

        That’s a bit of a reach. More than a bit. There’s always been opposition to these programs.Report

      • Kazzy in reply to Jaybird says:

        So, if this is the compromise, do you see more folks saying:
        “We should kill the program because of free riding.”
        -or-
        “We should expand the program even if it means more free riding.”

        It seems to me that part of the compromise is accepting a certain level of free riding. If folks are pushing back on that, then they are rejecting the compromise.

        ETA: If the original “compromise” was “We’ll offer a limited welfare system without significant means testing and a few free riders will get through” and folks are crying about the free riders, I’d say they could be considered to have negotiated in bad faith.Report

        • InMD in reply to Kazzy says:

          I think the conversation has never gone quite that way and the perception of it has changed along with levels of abundance. None of this starts with free riding.

          It starts more with things like:

          -should there be children without enough to eat in a country as wealthy as ours?
          -should there be elderly or disabled people becoming destitute because they can no longer work in a country as wealthy as ours?
          -should the generation that won WW2 be allowed to age into a position where they can’t get healthcare and die destitute and undignified (later expanded to older people generally)?

          But then over time you end up in a world thats vastly cheaper in terms of consumer goods but also suffering cost disease on things like housing and healthcare. People get mad about some tale of a sturdy beggar with a brand new iPhone, which is admittedly, kind of annoying. You also get into complexities like, am I preventing the child from hunger or am I padding the wallet of the proverbial free rider parent? These are understandable conversations in a way but they also completely miss the point on why these things actually exist, and why they’re so sticky even in the face of persistent efforts to undermine them.Report

          • Jaybird in reply to InMD says:

            The conversation was, of course, a *HUGE* oversimplification but here’s a question that I’m sure you remember:

            Should welfare recipients get drug tested?

            The argument for drug testing welfare recipients goes something to the effect of: “I have to work X hours a week. I cannot do drugs or else I will get fired. If I am going to be paying you to not work, I want you to not do drugs too (at the cost of you being fired).”

            (I’m sure you’re familiar with the arguments against drug testing welfare recipients. I am too. This isn’t about that.)Report

            • Philip H in reply to Jaybird says:

              The problem with that argument is the assumption that welfare is paying people not to work. Which it has been illegal to do since 1996 or so. Which, like the SNAP benefit fraud “issue,” means you have an argument about imposing a solution to a non-existent problem.

              That aside, where welfare recipients have been drug tested, the compliance rate/positive test rate has been such that the cost of the program far exceeds the benefits that any state has been able to deny.

              So that being the case, why do you think there’s this persistent myth that welfare recipients are drug abusing fraudsters? Who benefits from perpetuating those myths?Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Philip H says:

                That aside, where welfare recipients have been drug tested, the compliance rate/positive test rate has been such that the cost of the program far exceeds the benefits that any state has been able to deny

                I have no doubt that this is true.
                I also understand that this is beside the point.

                So that being the case, why do you think there’s this persistent myth that welfare recipients are drug abusing fraudsters? Who benefits from perpetuating those myths?

                It’s not that they *ARE* drug abusing fraudsters. It’s that the benefit is predicated on them not being such.

                You mention the 1996 law, well, one of the things that got it passed was the (in)famous MTV segment where ODB went to pick up his welfare check in a limo.

                If you’ve never seen the segment, you can enjoy it here (warning: it’s age-restricted).

                Why is there a persistent myth that this sort of thing happens? Well, I want to say because of some rotten apples.Report

              • Philip H in reply to Jaybird says:

                It’s not that they *ARE* drug abusing fraudsters. It’s that the benefit is predicated on them not being such.

                Yes, it is. That’s how the program has been set up for almost 3 decades. And states are scrupulous to the point of absurd obsession to keep it that way. And yet we are STILL debating whether the people using this aid DESERVE it and whether we should FURTHER TIGHTEN the already tight noose around their necks. The existence of that debate serves someone. Who do you think that is?Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Philip H says:

                There are two groups that the debate serves.

                The first is the group of people who campaign on keeping that noose there.

                The second is the group of people who benefit from the program (a program that would be gutted if that noose was removed entirely).Report

              • Chip Daniels in reply to Jaybird says:

                Republicanism, circa 2022.

                It doesn’t matter if it’s true or not, we like to think it is.Report

              • Dark Matter in reply to Jaybird says:

                the (in)famous MTV segment where ODB went to pick up his welfare check in a limo.

                I saw the clip and thought it was a parody.

                But no, ODB was a real person and this was him “being real”.

                Really long criminal record. Mental instability. Serious drug abuse. Various gun battles. OD’ed when he was 36 something like 20 years ago.

                Not the person you want as the face of your benefits program.Report

            • InMD in reply to Jaybird says:

              Sure. And I get why it comes up. But I do think a lot of it arises from a combination of ignorance on how the system actually works, why it’s there, and the difficulty in envisioning the beneficiaries of massive corporate welfare as targets for opprobrium (Trump of all people may have kinda sorta grazed it but failed to score a direct hit).

              Now I agree with you that for good or ill there’s a burden of making the case for why some crackhead getting freebies is a rare and ultimately small beans topic of misdirection. But in the greater scheme of things I think it is pretty clearly a rare and small beans topic of misdirection.Report

              • Philip H in reply to InMD says:

                Now I agree with you that for good or ill there’s a burden of making the case for why some crackhead getting freebies is a rare and ultimately small beans topic of misdirection.

                This case has been made, and made, and made. we have almost 30 years of statistics that its been made. Most of the ardent conservatives here – Jaybird included – still think the case, as made, is a lie.Report

              • InMD in reply to Philip H says:

                No one will ever be relieved of the burden of making their case. That’s just the nature of our system, and arguably a feature of it.Report

              • Jaybird in reply to InMD says:

                But in the greater scheme of things I think it is pretty clearly a rare and small beans topic of misdirection.

                Rare? Certainly. Small beans? I don’t know that it is.

                The cherry picked outliers are sufficient to change the entire debate.

                That’s a reality that the people who want to lean on pointing out that the cherry picked outliers are not only outliers, they’re cherry picked need to constantly be on top of. “See? The outlier you’re pointing to was *PUNISHED*! The system works!”

                Without that, you’re going to find yourself not only without a majority but without a plurality.Report

              • InMD in reply to Jaybird says:

                For sure, you need an answer. And I think part of that answer is being prepped with the facts, and the other part is being able to articulate a better target that inspires people to agree with the policies you want to provide.

                I mean there’s a reason some random Senator from Vermont has has had a decent little movement behind him for the last decade. His message discipline is incredible. Whatever your thoughts on his particular policy stances it’s not like it can’t be done.Report

              • Jaybird in reply to InMD says:

                I think that the argument that “not only do they benefit from these transfers, *YOU* benefit from them!” is a strong argument. Rattle off all of the benefits that everybody gets from the system.

                If you can’t do that, you’re going to find yourself having to deal with a counter-argument that argues something like “as a whole, we’d all be better off without it”.

                If you don’t have that list, you’re going to find yourself having to deal with their list of costs, costs, and more costs. And, yes, a couple of cherry picked outliers.Report

              • InMD in reply to Jaybird says:

                I agree with that too. I never called myself a libertarian but to the extent I was ever libertarian curious about some of these things in my younger days, this is the line if thinking that killed it.Report

              • Jaybird in reply to InMD says:

                Have you seen the recent program for harm reduction sites?

                It’s being spun by the opposition as “free crack pipes” but any fact-checkers will tell you that it’s *NOT* free crack pipes, it’s a whole bunch of stuff that happens to include safe smoking kits and those safe smoking kits include rubber mouthpieces for glass pipes to prevent injuries.

                I’m looking at the gameboard and thinking that this was an unforced error.

                But I’m one of those “if you want harm reduction, move weed from schedule 1 to schedule 4” kinda guys.Report

              • InMD in reply to Jaybird says:

                Yes, I actually woke up this morning to several NSFW memes from my brother on the subject.

                If he is seeing them overseas I can only imagine what is going around over here in the various political ecosystems that I mostly avoid.Report

              • Greg In Ak in reply to Jaybird says:

                This kind of harm reduction has been around for decades. It’s old and effective. It’s not an error or surprise the rubio’s are aiming the sleaze cannon at it. That is what they have always done. Why is this a surprise now? Even the specific lies are the same lies they have been saying since the 80’s.

                Again, if you think easy pot is going to stop meth/heroin addicts from dying then there is an ….umm…..an severe information disparity occurring here.Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Greg In Ak says:

                Greg, it’s more that I scratch my head at the politicians who keep weed on Schedule 1 but think we should move toward safer meth smoking.

                I do not think that this is a political football that is likely to move downfield and the fact that they’re picking up that one instead of a half dozen other ones does not fill me with confidence.

                Maybe they’ll declare the pandemic over in time for it to matter for the elections… but not *TOO* early, of course.Report

              • Greg In Ak in reply to Jaybird says:

                Pot should be legal. This aint about pot. If i was for ending the drug war, which i am and you are, i would probably think that we should be helping and treating addicts with every tool possible to allow them to lead full and healthy lives. Harm reduction does that. Conservatives and R’s have been demonizing HR for decades. D’s have been trying to get more and R’s have been fighting it with just this kind of poo cannon. Might as well by 1993.Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Greg In Ak says:

                It’s not about pot. It’s about the Federal Government moving to making meth smoking safer by providing rubber tips for glass pipes.

                What is the federal position on Mary Jane, Greg? Has it moved away from Schedule 1 and I missed it?

                I mean, let’s face it, I’d much rather be a politician defending moving it to schedule 2 (“The same schedule as cocaine!”, I could argue) than I would be defending making smoking meth less likely to result in chapped lips.

                Quite honestly, I’d much rather be defending moving pot to schedule 2 in the comments of a discussion board than defending making smoking meth safer.Report

              • Greg In Ak in reply to Jaybird says:

                Ahh i see. I dont’ really care about whether i want to defend this or that but what is good policy that will save peoples lives. All the end the DW peeps seem to talk about treating addicts instead of throwing in the pokey. That stuff saves money and lives. It’s far better than jail. That kind of liberal help people crap that little marco is po’d by.Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Greg In Ak says:

                I’m unclear about the numbers of lives saved by rubber tips for glass meth pipes.

                Do you have any handy?

                I’m sure as someone hoping to help people, you’ve got more to argue for your position than strong assurances of the purity of your intentions, correct?Report

              • Greg In Ak in reply to Jaybird says:

                Dont’ have numbers and i’ leaving work in a few so not gonna use the google foo. I worked as a counselor in a drug trt program for a few years that used some hard reduction concepts . Also used HR ideas with chronically mentally ill/ substance abusing clients. But i don’t have an digits off the top of my head.Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Greg In Ak says:

                I think that Harm Reduction is a good policy! But I admit to thinking that “Harm Reduction” meant stuff like Narcan.

                It means rubber tips for meth pipes as well? Huh. I’m pretty sure that I am not a fan of rubber tips for meth pipes. Not, you know, *FUNDING* them, anyway.

                I suppose the good news is that the US Department of Health and Human Services has stipulated that it will *NOT* be using federal funds to include glass pipes in the safe smoking kits.

                Report

              • Chip Daniels in reply to Jaybird says:

                If anyone ever wants to know why no politician anywhere wants to reschedule marijuana, have them read this subthread.Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                I’d hope that they include this comment!

                Among younger adults, there is wider support for legalization for medical and recreational uses, including 70% of adults under age 30.

                Republicans are more wary than Democrats about legalizing marijuana for recreational use: 47% of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents favor legalizing marijuana for both medical and recreational use, while an additional 40% say it should only be legal for medical use. By comparison, 72% of Democrats and Democratic leaners say marijuana should be legal for both medical and recreational use, and an additional 23% say it should be legal for medical use only.

                If there are further comments talking about the difference between marijuana and crack, I hope the politicians read those as well!Report

              • Chip Daniels in reply to Jaybird says:

                Sorry, i couldn’t hear any of that over the din of the Great Crack Pipe Freakout and OuttaControl Crime Lollapalooza.

                And this is from the Sensible Edumacated Socially Liberal folks at Ordinary Times!

                If the liberals don’t have their backs on sensible harm reduction, what upside is there for MJ legalization, knowing that Frank Luntz and Chris Rufo and the God Bothering Caucus is sharpening their messaging skill for the Strapping Young Bucks Hopped Up On Reefer Panic of 2024?Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                Well, then. I encourage you to argue that the US Department of Health and Human Services should go back to including crack pipes and rubber tips for them in their safe smoking kits and that anybody who doesn’t agree is someone who probably opposes the rescheduling of Marijuana.

                You know, like you conflate libertarianism with anarchism.Report

              • Greg In Ak in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                Also see, Afghanistan, US getting out of.

                “Get us out of Afghanistan.”
                “Okay, here you go”
                “No not like that. “*

                * Yup of course they could have done it better. But you want out, we got out.Report

              • Greg In Ak in reply to Jaybird says:

                It’s better, IMHO, to help people before they need a life saving drug to prevent their death.Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Greg In Ak says:

                I would agree!

                To what extent do rubber tips for glass pipes do this?Report

            • Dark Matter in reply to Jaybird says:

              There is a line between “helping someone” and “enabling them to be dysfunctional”… or even “encouraging them to be dysfunctional”.

              Unfortunately, where that line is can be different for every person and/or every culture.

              It’s seems a misuse of gov money to pay people to not work, to not get married, and/or to get high.Report

        • Jaybird in reply to Kazzy says:

          What do I *SEE* happening? More people calling to kill the program.

          What do I *WANT* to see happening? I think the original essay does an *AMAZING* job of arguing for expansion and pointing out to people that, hey, a free lunch doesn’t only help you, it helps others. Talk about it as a multiplier or something.

          It seems to me that part of the compromise is accepting a certain level of free riding.

          There’s “accepting it as inevitable but still arguing that it should be disincentivized” and “accepting it as inevitable and disincentivizing arguments that it’s bad”.Report

          • Swami in reply to Jaybird says:

            I think your fictional dialogue summarizes the issue well. There can be good, widespread support for efficient safety nets (and there empirically is). But eventually conservatives see these programs taken over by people who don’t just not worry about free riding (see Chip’s initial quote), and they seem to actually be incentivizing and rewarding bad behavior. This leads to conservatives and libertarians deciding the best program (in this world run by do-gooder progressives) is to just cancel it altogether.

            I keep thinking about the homeless problem where the size of the issue seems to be directly correlated with how much progressives try to solve it. See SanFransicko. If I wanted to promote homelessness and drug abuse I would follow the SF model.Report

            • Chip Daniels in reply to Swami says:

              Which city has handled homelessness better than SF?

              Keep in mind few homeless people were born and raised in the city in which they live. Most were born and raised in the suburbs surrounding the city.

              So if I wanted to promote homelessness and drug abuse I’d do what most suburban communities do, which is ignore the problem and hope they move somewhere else.Report

              • Add to that, relatively few bucks can get you anywhere in the US. California’s major metros essentially never have lethal weather. Chicago winter will kill you. Ditto for parts of a St. Louis summer.

                Completely off topic, but I don’t understand people who say, “I’ll settle in the Midwest to avoid the consequences of climate change.” The extremes are going to be worse in both temperature directions. Free advice: choose altitude, not latitude.Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                An additional perspective on how San Francisco is handling both homelessness and harm reduction.

                Report

              • Dark Matter in reply to Jaybird says:

                Ouch. By far the best link. Well worth the 2 minutes it takes to listen to him.Report

              • Chip Daniels in reply to Jaybird says:

                This is from “Totally Real Things That Absolutely Happen” file, right?Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                Believe it or not, he addresses that in the thread!

                Report

              • Chip Daniels in reply to Jaybird says:

                Ok so even if take the assertion at face value, that the vast majority of homeless people are addicts, what solution does that suggest?Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                I’m just looking at your question of “Which city has handled homelessness better than SF?”

                If the implication is “SF has handled it the best out of anybody”, I’d like to give some context for what “the best out of anybody” looks like in actual practice.

                There are plenty of other cities that have not achieved what SF has, apparently, achieved.

                Taking the assertions at face value, of course.

                Maybe these guys are all crisis actors.Report

              • Chip Daniels in reply to Jaybird says:

                A guy in Texas becomes an addict, loses his job and home.

                Which part of this Texas Miracle should San Francisco emulate?Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                Which part of this San Franciscan miracle do you think all other cities should emulate?Report

              • Chip Daniels in reply to Jaybird says:

                You brought this into the discussion, not me.

                It’s OK to just say “I don’t have any idea what to do about homelessness.”Report

              • Dark Matter in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                “I don’t have any idea what to do about homelessness.”

                While we’re waiting for technology to increase…

                Make aid contingent on functional behavior?

                The advantage of that is we’re not enabling and we may be able to make some people more functional.

                The disadvantage is we’re going to have some people die.

                Now the other thing we could do is tear up SF’s local control over their zoning and the various local ways they have to prevent housing from being created.

                That would make housing less expensive which would help in various related things.Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                Yes, I brought it in as evidence in the argument about how San Francisco is doing it better than anybody else.

                This is what that looks like.

                For what it’s worth, I do not see San Francisco as something to emulate. I see something that, if I were trying to defend San Francisco out of habit, I’d claim was a bunch of crisis actors and people lying about what’s happening because, of course, this isn’t *REAL*.

                Assuming it’s real, I see a city that is making things worse.

                And whatever the solution happens to be, the ability to say “this is making things worse, we should stop doing it” is an important first step to getting to whatever the solution happens to be.Report

              • Chip Daniels in reply to Jaybird says:

                If you think SF is making it worse, what should they stop doing?

                What would be the outcome of your suggested change?

                P.s. This guy became a drunk in Texas. Is Texas also making things worse?Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                Well, let’s look at what the guy said.

                “the drugs, the non-enforcement of anti-camping laws, and the $820/month in welfare & food stamps”

                Is that accurate? I mean, is that something that San Francisco is doing? If the guy is lying, then we can wave away the entire thread!

                Let’s assume it’s accurate.

                Maybe something could be done about the drugs, at least. The guy sold fentanyl. Is that currently actually illegal in SF? If it is illegal, maybe we could explore law enforcement options when it comes to the selling of fentanyl?

                I mean, if you don’t understand how that might help, pretend, instead, that he’s selling loosies.Report

              • Chip Daniels in reply to Jaybird says:

                Ok so you want stricter enforcement of the war on drugs.Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                Depends on the drugs. For example, I think that Weed should be somewhere in the area of red, red wine when it comes to how available (and restricted) it ought to be.

                There are other substances that strike me as being worth enforcing the law for.

                Fentanyl is one of them.

                Like, you know how you feel about loosies? That’s how I feel about fentanyl.Report

              • Chip Daniels in reply to Jaybird says:

                So let’s probe your suggestion.

                What would be some foreseeable outcomes of an increased enforcement of drugs?

                Based on the last 50 years of experience.

                And does alcohol come into question?Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                For one thing, you’d have one less guy selling Fentanyl on the street to teenagers.

                I mean, seriously. Imagine if he was selling loosies!

                There are cities where people don’t have to worry about loosies being sold. Are they doing better with loosies than San Fran is doing with Fentanyl?Report

              • Chip Daniels in reply to Jaybird says:

                I’m ignoring your attempts to shift the focus.

                So given that you want to arrest lots more people, doesn’t this mean an enlargement of the police departments and jails and prisons?

                Is there some notion of how much this will cost and where this money will come from?Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                Chip, you don’t seem to understand how fentanyl might actually be bad enough for the community to have law enforcement enforce fentanyl-related laws.

                I’m asking you to treat fentanyl the way you have treated loosies in the past.

                I mean, if you understand how the police might want to disincent laws against loosies, could you understand how someone else might see fentanyl as being in the ballpark of being as bad as cigarettes?

                “So given that you want to arrest lots more people, doesn’t this mean an enlargement of the police departments and jails and prisons?”

                From what I understand of San Francisco, the police have been told that the arrests that they make will not be prosecuted for a number of low-level crimes like shoplifting and, apparently, selling fentanyl.

                My argument is to reshuffle the police force that used to go after shoplifting to go after selling fentanyl.

                Oh, and for the prosecutor to actually prosecute it.Report

              • Chip Daniels in reply to Jaybird says:

                You think I’m arguing with you.
                I’m not.

                You are saying that we should arrest more people, many many more people as a way of solving homelessness.

                I’m just pointing out how this will require a massive expansion of the state power, along with a massive increase of taxation.

                Again, not even arguing, just clarifying.Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                I’m not entirely certain that it’ll be “many, many more people” arrested due to arresting people for fentanyl.

                Will it be? Has San Francisco fallen so far?

                It’s true that I believe that there are many causes to homelessness and one of them is stuff like “fentanyl”.

                Nipping fentanyl in the bud will help address homelessness.

                My evidence for this? Well, there’s the guy who admitted moving to be homeless in San Francisco because of the drugs.

                Disincent homelessness! Don’t incent it!Report

              • Chip Daniels in reply to Jaybird says:

                Its ok to say “I don’t have any idea how to solve homelessness.”Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                See, my bar isn’t “Solve it”.

                It’s “Do better than San Francisco”.

                For my part, I believe that it is possible to do better than San Fran.Report

              • Dark Matter in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                What would be some foreseeable outcomes of an increased enforcement of drugs?

                Society has embraced weed. There are too many people who use it. Genii is out of the bottle.

                That’s also true for alcohol, guns, and tobacco. No matter how great society would be if we got rid of them, we literally can’t.

                In terms of “least amount of damage to society”, all of those need to be legal.

                When it comes to ice and coke, I’m not sure what the “least amount of damage” is. Presumably with coke we need some level of legalization but these are really hard drugs and do a lot of damage.

                Ice (speed, meth) mess people up at pretty high rates and the case for their rec use is lower.Report

              • Chip Daniels in reply to Dark Matter says:

                Agreed on all counts.

                Which still leaves us at , “OK, so now what?”

                If it seems like I am a bit sharp on this topic, its because this is how the conversation always, always, always goes.

                Somebody, like a drunk at the end of a bar, shouts “Homelessness is OuttaControl! We Oughta DO Something!”

                Then is asked, “OK, so like what?”

                Then [snip, about 30 or 40 irrelevant asides and digressions and attempts at deflection]
                “Well, we outghta arrest ’em all!”

                “OK, so how much will this cost and where will we get the money?”

                [squid cloud of ink] “How bout them Dodgers!”

                I mean, really, it doesn’t matter what your politics are or how you feel about the situation, there is no solution that doesn’t involve a massive reshuffling of priorities and expansion of government power and a crap-ton of money.
                If you think $500,000 for an apartment unit is a lot, tell me how much it costs to build a prison cell.
                If you think mental health counselors are expensive, tell me how much police officers are.

                So I am really just exhausted, after years of this nonsense and have very little patience any more with the barstool pundit type comments.Report

              • Dark Matter in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                If we’re into “least amount of damage for the least amount of cost”, then we do pretty much nothing except when they break the law.

                So arrest the guy supplying fentanyl to minors, he’s pretty far over the line.

                He’s allowed to have a tent somewhere that doesn’t cause problems. He’s allowed food stamps or whatever we’re calling them now. He’s not allowed to shoplift.

                Him being homeless is not a problem for society except when he makes it a problem by breaking the normal rules.

                That’s pretty much how I feel about inequality as well. It can be an indication of problems but it’s not a problem in and of itself.Report

              • Chip Daniels in reply to Dark Matter says:

                This sounds intuitively correct, except it leaves out the status quo cost of homelessness even when they break no laws.

                Property owners know that the presence of tent cities outside their business causes a drop in value of the property, often amounting to millions of dollars individually, and billions in the aggregate.

                Homeless people have tremendously high rates of medical problems, which require a massive amount of EMT and public health services.

                But maybe, even after accounting for all these costs, the best solution we can envision is the status quo.

                But then we should acknowledge that what we see in this video is exactly what we prefer and what we have all chosen.Report

              • Dark Matter in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                Homeless people have tremendously high rates of medical problems, which require a massive amount of EMT and public health services.

                When we’ve tried to “save” money by giving away HC to avoid EMT costs, we’ve found that it doesn’t save money. Actually we’ve found it breaks the bank.

                Property owners know that the presence of tent cities outside their business causes a drop in value of the property, often amounting to millions of dollars individually, and billions in the aggregate.

                This is why businesses pass laws that criminalize this, and the cops end up herding them elsewhere.

                But then we should acknowledge that what we see in this video is exactly what we prefer and what we have all chosen.

                True for SNAP and the tent. Not true for shoplifting and drug dealing.

                And probably not true for his San Fran extra income which pays him to be homeless and high… although to be fair idk if that’s within the normal rules or if that’s a San Fran thing.Report

              • Dark Matter in reply to Dark Matter says:

                Another way that’s been tried during covid is repurposing (dead?) hotels.

                The idea is that if you give them some level of housing you can address mental health and addiction needs more easily.

                However imho that still doesn’t give them a pass on selling fentanyl to minors and so on.

                Whether that’s a solution for the top half of the homeless only idk.Report

              • Dark Matter in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                It suggests SF is less “dealing with homelessness” and more attracting it.

                It also suggests homelessness is multiple problems.

                Short term economic by otherwise functional people (see also: short term).

                Long term by dysfunctional people.

                I’m not sure that later problem is fixable with our current level of technology. We have people researching addiction and hope to come up with a magic pill at some point.

                Similarly there are various magic sanity pills for various conditions which transform people.Report

              • Chip Daniels in reply to Dark Matter says:

                What did San Francisco do to make Texans become drunks?Report

              • Dark Matter in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                What did San Francisco do to make Texans become drunks?

                Become a drunk? Nothing.

                Enable him to stay a drunk? That may be a different issue.Report

              • Chip Daniels in reply to Dark Matter says:

                What can San Francisco do to make this guy sober?

                Texas obviously failed, so what can San Francisco do differently?

                It’s OK to say “I don’t have any idea what to do about homelessness”.Report

              • Dark Matter in reply to Jaybird says:

                Various sources suggest about two thirds of the homeless have addiction issues.

                A 10 year old dot gov pdf claims about 30% of people who are chronically homeless have mental health conditions and about 50% have co-occurring substance use problems.

                The same source quotes a different source which claims those numbers are really 60% have mental health issues and 80% addiction.

                https://www.samhsa.gov/sites/default/files/programs_campaigns/homelessness_programs_resources/hrc-factsheet-current-statistics-prevalence-characteristics-homelessness.pdfReport

              • Chip Daniels in reply to Dark Matter says:

                Agreed.

                Now what?Report

              • Swami in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                I answered the same question last week on this forum. Cities which wish to suppress street defecating, mentally unstable fentanyl and meth addicts should do the following:
                1) Ask them to immediately go to a warm shelter with food which prohibits drug and alcohol use and which sends mental cases to proper facilities
                2) If they refuse, ask them to leave town
                3) If they refuse further, arrest them or supply a one way van way out of town

                I am well aware that there are other towns out there who delusionally believe that the root cause of defecating drug addicts has something to do with home availability or prices. They are welcome to our hobos too. In the end, to solve the problem I believe the key is not to outrun the bear, it is just to be the least amenable place to junkies and street scum.

                In other words, the key to solving the problem with tent junkies is to send them to your town, as until they get you to see how despicable they are, you will turn a blind eye.

                I see these bums on a daily basis at the beach. They are virtually all junkies and few seem even remotely stable.

                To paraphrase Henny Youngman. “take the homeless,…. please”Report

              • Chip Daniels in reply to Swami says:

                You know that during the pandemic the State of California did exactly your item #1, where they filled the empty motels with homeless people.

                It was and is a great success with only one drawback, that there weren’t enough rooms to match the need.

                So your suggestion is well taken. But now the question is how to provide beds for the tens or hundreds of thousands of homeless?

                For those with mental or addiction issues, how to supervise and medicate them?

                And for your last issue, how will we fund and construct this archipelago of prisons given that the ones we have right now are overflowing?

                Once again and for the umpteenth time, I’m not even arguing with you, I just want to have a serious discussion and not a drunk at the end of the bar one.Report

              • Dark Matter in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                If the problem is too big, then the local solution is communities will say “not in my back yard” and force them out.

                The weird part is this seems like a modern problem. What happened in the 1950’s?Report

              • Philip H in reply to Dark Matter says:

                What happened in the 1950’s?

                We forcibly institutionalized the mentally ill, drug addicts, and pretty much anyone who wasn’t neurotypical (and a fair number of LGBTQ+ folks).Report

              • Chip Daniels in reply to Dark Matter says:

                Also in the 1950s veterans with PTSD were given free mental health treatment, all veterans were given generous housing loans and large public housing projects were constructed and the supply of housing was boosted by massive government spending on infrastructure and cheap loans.

                Some of these programs worked splendidly, others not so.
                As Philip noted, the mental institutions weren’t ideal; they were marked by underfunding and poor oversight and ended up being a cesspool of abuse and neglect, and the large public housing projects didn’t work because simply packing poor people into warehouses doesn’t work.

                The reason homelessness is so intractable is that it doesn’t arise from a single source and can’t be solved by a single silver bullet.

                It will require a lot of “necessary but insufficient” measures requiring a high degree of cooperation and coordination Everything from relaxing zoning laws (which will require the political defeat of NIMBYs) to investment in mental health treatment in lieu of jail (which will require the political defeat of the “OuttaControl Crime!” lobby and the prison-industrial complex) and mostly money, lots of money and taxes which will require the defeat of the “Small Gummint!” lobby.Report

              • Pinky in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                How much of a lobby do you think there is for the prison-industrial complex? At least, that wouldn’t automatically become the lobby for the institutional-industrial complex?Report

              • Philip H in reply to Pinky says:

                Private prisons are a $4 Billion per year business. I’m guessing they lobby like a $4 Billion a year business segment.Report

              • Pinky in reply to Philip H says:

                OK, and if they became $4 billion per year private psychiatric institutions, they’d be lobbying like $4 billion per year businesses, right?Report

              • Dark Matter in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                When I think about it, in the 1950’s we also didn’t have some of the harder drugs and also we wouldn’t have paid that guy to sleep on the street.

                So you get hooked on drugs and fall apart, or you’re crazy and self medicate and fall apart.

                Being on the street is both the cause and the result of various issues, and after you’re there it’s hard to get out.

                I think the optimal solution is the “magic pill”.

                I have a family member who has what used to cause the “village idiot”. Thyroid is low, that very slowly lowers IQ. Low single digit percentages per year.

                He takes a pill, it fixes the underlying condition. Normal IQ, normal energy level, it’s just magic. There are others, depression has a pill, etc. Its basically impossible to deal with these conditions without the pill.

                The pill we need now is how to cure addiction (and whatever other mental illnesses are common).

                Well that’s a point. How many homeless have magic pills out there waiting for them if they weren’t homeless?Report

              • Philip H in reply to Dark Matter says:

                Well that’s a point. How many homeless have magic pills out there waiting for them if they weren’t homeless?

                A good many. Some communities are trying to house then help but as Chip notes above that’s not a silver bullet; it takes money; and it takes time.Report

              • Chip Daniels in reply to Dark Matter says:

                FWIW, the single most destructive drug in existence is alcohol and it’s not even close.

                No, I don’t have any idea how to solve that.Report

              • Pinky in reply to Dark Matter says:

                There are cases where there’s a literal pill that would help them, but they refuse to take it. And it’s not an easy issue. Without getting into a vaccine mandate conversation, it’s hard to say that it’s appropriate for the government to require a person to take medication, particularly medication that alters the brain function. Schizophrenics and those suffering from bipolar disorders often decide that they’re doing well enough that they can discontinue their meds.

                Government is great with single silver bullets. Complex situations can often be better handled with fewer rules and greater personal interaction.Report

              • Philip H in reply to Pinky says:

                Complex situations can often be better handled with fewer rules and greater personal interaction.

                You, Chip, and me actually agree here – a lot of this requires long term professional support to reverse. While some larger religious charity organizations are up to parts of the task (Catholic Charities in some major metro areas) it really does take government agency intervention and stable tax funding to achieve this objective because of the long term nature of the problem.Report

              • Pinky in reply to Philip H says:

                I completely disagree. Government can never be flexible enough at higher levels to be able to handle difficult situations.Report

              • File13 in reply to Pinky says:

                Government “flexibility”:
                1) Mandate saying “you must not be vaccinated, it is a matter of national security”
                2) General Mandate, saying “all DoD servicemen must be vaccinated.”

                Solution: You are now a Rastafarian.

                This is not, actually, a joke.Report

              • Chip Daniels in reply to Pinky says:

                This is an ideological statement of faith, not fact.

                Taking your statement at face value, this means the military can’t handle difficult situations.
                Nor can the police.
                Or the Coast Guard. Or the FAA, the CIA, NSC.

                The court systems are incapable of addressing difficult situations.

                OBVIOUSLY you did not mean that.

                What I think you mean is that government lacks the ability to address social ills.

                And I don’t necessarily disagree!

                But reducing homelessness to a manageable level doesn’t require government to do that; Other entities like churches and self-help organization like AA can do that.

                But those entities need the logistical and legal infrastructure muscle which the government can provide. They need operating funds, land use decisions allowing them to operate, legal protections and cooperation from law enforcement.Report

              • Pinky in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                The higher the level of government, the less flexible. That’s definitional. You can’t have flexibility and uniformity at the same time. There’s always a tradeoff.Report

              • Chip Daniels in reply to Pinky says:

                Even without arguing your assertion, what makes it in opposition to Phillip’s and my comment?

                Like, if I assert that a charity needs the government to make its soup kitchen legal, or provide funding for a food bank, does this “flexibility” issue even come into play?Report

              • Pinky in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                You and Dark Matter were discussing the fact that there’s no single magic bullet for issues of homelessness. Multiple solutions to overlapping problems require flexibility.

                ETA: I haven’t read the whole thread, so I’m not sure if this observation is in opposition to what the two of you were saying. Not everything is an argument.Report

              • Dark Matter in reply to Pinky says:

                RE: Gov flexibility

                “Family Court” is a great example of flexibility and no case is the same.

                There are guidelines, even laws, but the judge is given a huge amount of flexibility and power to do what he thinks is best.

                Family Court is the evil unloved step child of the court system. The rest of the system doesn’t want to touch it.

                Appealing it’s rulings is close to impossible. The appeals court knows you can be dealing with two rich, highly functional, highly motivated people who hate each other, lie about each other, and are fighting over their children. Or you can be dealing with truly evil levels of dysfunction.

                The judge is entrusted with a ton of authority and is mostly allowed to do whatever he wants in that context.

                If we’re going to take that as an example… it’s scary. A judge could declare someone mentally ill and strip them of their civil rights and force them to do various things.

                Presumably this instantly gets weaponized and used corruptly and politically.Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                Taking your statement at face value, this means the military can’t handle difficult situations.

                Depends on the difficult situation.

                Do you want to kill people and break things?

                The military is exceptionally good at this.

                If you want them to, oh… I dunno… Establish a democracy that is really open to American soybean imports?

                The record gets spottier.Report

              • Pinky in reply to Jaybird says:

                Again, there’s a tradeoff. The military has to maintain a very tough balance between uniformity and flexibility. Uniformity can lead to McNamara’s war; flexibility can lead to Abu Ghraib. The one advantage that the military has over most federal-level programs is the clarity of successes and failures.Report

              • Dark Matter in reply to Pinky says:

                flexibility can lead to Abu Ghraib

                And there you go.

                The ability to strip the homeless of their “right” to make bad choices is also the ability to do extremely ugly things.Report

              • Pinky in reply to Dark Matter says:

                I never said it was a tradeoff between rainbows and festive balloons! Once you clear the low-hanging fruit, you’re left with tradeoffs, and they can be brutal.

                And we *want* government to err on the side of treating people the same. That’s “laws not men”. But it means that government won’t be responsive or reasonable, won’t give a guy a break based on the cut of his jib.Report

  7. Chip Daniels says:

    All this talk and we haven’t mentioned rentseeking or “in kind” transfers or just the structural benefits people never seem to mind.

    The dialog always seems to imagine the for everyone except those on public aid, the government is an indifferent and detached entity when it actually is a very engaged and partisan actor working on our behalf.Report

    • Dark Matter in reply to Chip Daniels says:

      Can you get more specific?Report

      • Chip Daniels in reply to Dark Matter says:

        Talk to a libertarian, about a world in which there is no central banking, no government currency, no secondary mortgage market, no tariffs or price controls, where the taxpayers are not providing free policing of the world’s shipping lanes, where there are no roads constructed via eminent domain, where patent and copyright don’t exist…

        What if Atlas actually did shrug?Report

        • Jaybird in reply to Chip Daniels says:

          You’re conflating “libertarianism” with “anarchism” and then waving away the “libertarians aren’t anarchists” counter-arguments as “Not True Libertarians”.

          Again.Report

          • Chip Daniels in reply to Jaybird says:

            I’m just using the perception which is out there.Report

          • Burt Likko in reply to Jaybird says:

            Well, there are anarcho-libertarians and anarcho-libertarianism is pretty close to the basic model of libertarianism that gets used as the bailey in a number of relatively common arguments here and elsewhere.

            Yes, the reality is that libertarians exist on a spectrum from full on might-as-well-be-anarchists to minimal statists to liberaltarians. (Whatever that last term means, which I’ve never been real clear on.) And then there’s those who conceal political world views that have some ugly facets behind the word libertarianism, with whom other libertarians don’t want much to do with.

            It’s one thing to say you want there to be less government and more leaving stuff up to the market to work out. It’s something else to confront the reality of whatever that means, wherever you want to draw the line. Relatively peaceful, priacy-free international shipping lanes require expensive ships to patrol and use force on would-be pirates, and then to keep on patrolling after the pirates have gone away, lest they return. Which requires someone to pay for those military vessels and free riders being as common as they are, a voluntary association is not going to do it. So to pay for something that is indirect enough from, and invisible enough to, the people whose money is actually paying for it to question the need for and therefore you’re going to need to invest the collectors with the ability to use force and oh shit look we just invented government.Report

            • Jaybird in reply to Burt Likko says:

              So no patent law? No copyright law either? At all?

              And that’s the libertarian position?

              Isn’t it also the progressive opinion given that these things should belong to the collective?Report

              • Greg In Ak in reply to Jaybird says:

                First para: Nice re-imagining some lines for Imagine. I can hear Lennon singing them. Makes the song more current.

                Prog opinion is that King Crimson absolutely rules still but i can accept that Yes is also great. Lots of Prog opinions out there and it’s like herding cats to figure out who thinks what.Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Greg In Ak says:

                Greg, did you read Chip’s comment?

                Here, I’ll quote the relevant part:
                where patent and copyright don’t exist

                It was not me remixing John Lennon (something, I’d grant, people should be able to do by now).Report

              • Greg In Ak in reply to Jaybird says:

                I read Chips comment but preferred to just riff on your sentence sounded like Imagine to me. Sing the sentence, IT FITS.

                King Crimson does indeed rock and trying to figure out the beliefs of Prog’s is a mess because they are all over the place.Report

              • Philip H in reply to Jaybird says:

                Progressives don’t say that. If anything we want the people creating the works to be way better compensated then they are under the current system.Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Philip H says:

                If a handful of them do, so I’m afraid that I’m going to need you to point that out to Chip and Burt.Report

              • Burt Likko in reply to Jaybird says:

                So no patent law? No copyright law either? At all?
                And that’s the libertarian position?

                Hell if I know man. I’m not a libertarian. The best I can tell you is I don’t see a uniform libertarian position on how IP rights can be derived, recognized, enforced, and expired (if ever). I’d be willing to wager at least a trivial sum of Dogecoin that there are approximately as many libertarian policy proposals for the creation of and/or modification of IP regimes as there are libertarians who have bothered to give the issue serious contemplation.

                The point I wanted to make above is libertarians can’t quite hand-wave away anarchism because there are at least some libertarians who espouse something that approximates it. It can be as simple as “Well, I’m not one of THOSE, here’s what I think,” which gives a libertarian the opportunity to indulge in what is often their favorite sport: didactically beginning from a verbose articulation of first principles.Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Burt Likko says:

                Well, I’ll let us get back to discussing the libertarian world in which there is no central banking, no government currency, no secondary mortgage market, no tariffs or price controls, where the taxpayers are not providing free policing of the world’s shipping lanes, where there are no roads constructed via eminent domain, where patent and copyright don’t exist as if I hadn’t objected to that original framing.Report

              • DensityDuck in reply to Burt Likko says:

                “Ilibertarians can’t quite hand-wave away anarchism because there are at least some libertarians who espouse something that approximates it.”

                Yes, just like how Muslims can’t handwave away lethal antisemitic violence because at least some Muslims espouse something that approximates it.

                “you can’t be serious! looking for extreme examples of odious behavior and declaring those to be representative of the movement as a whole and demanding that moderate adherents accept responsibility for that interpretation is silly!”

                welp

                yes it is, isn’t itReport

            • Damon in reply to Burt Likko says:

              ” Which requires someone to pay for those military vessels and free riders being as common as they are, a voluntary association is not going to do it.”

              Theoretically, you could allocate the costs of such “actions” to all companies in the import export business, which would then trickle down into the price of goods coming in from overseas.Report