Jump to content
Objectivism Online Forum

Any historical examples of "donation"-based Gov.t?

Rate this topic


Recommended Posts

I have not yet been able to procure a copy of "Capitalism, the unknown ideal" of "The Virture of Selfishness" and my appologies if the answer to this problem is in either book, or any other book by Ayn Rand.

I understand that in order to fund services which would be impractical to put directly under private control such as the road outside my house, (I should not have a to pay a toll just to drive out of the garage to the street, before I even get on the highway) the solution is to put such things under private donations. Is there any historical example of when this has been applied? Ideally, successfully? The only example I can think of is NPR (Despite its liberal slant, it still is of a higher quality then then infotainment such as CNN or Fox) but even then, NPR still does depend slightly on taxes, so is not a complete success.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

This is rather a peculiar question.

First off, a donation is not an exchange; it is offering a value for which you expect no return. Thus, taking "donations" to maintain the road outside your house is a bizarre idea; you expect to receive a benefit. It's an exchange, not a donation, whether you spend the money on (cheaply) doing it yourself or (more expensive, cash-wise) hire someone else to do it or go in with a whole bunch of neighbors and ALL hire someone else to do it.

So, the answer would be that private donations are not solicited to repair private roads; PAYMENT is solicited in exchange for work, same as everything else. The difference between now and this theoretical future is that NOW the government points a gun at you and takes your money to build and maintain roads that you have no interest in and will never use.

I expect all manner of agreements would arise, from businesses creating massive parking complexes (hmm, like they do now) and the roads to access them (if people can't get to your store, they can't shop!), to housing developers building their own roads and then advertising them as part of the value of the houses (convenient to shopping!). The only time you'd probably have to dig in your pockets to build your own road as an individual would be if you wanted to live way out in the country.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

This is rather a peculiar question.

First off, a donation is not an exchange; it is offering a value for which you expect no return.  Thus, taking "donations" to maintain the road outside your house is a bizarre idea; you expect to receive a benefit.  It's an exchange, not a donation, whether you spend the money on (cheaply) doing it yourself or (more expensive, cash-wise) hire someone else to do it or go in with a whole bunch of neighbors and ALL hire someone else to do it.

I think that you can classify some donations as exchanges. One would give to PBS or NPR because they expect to benefit from the programming that the services provide. Now, The horrid Tsunami benefit program that popped up on the television and in many places was an example of donations, where for most there would be no beneficial return.

It appears that your problem is relating to bounds of government and what services it should provide. I think that the only non-negotiable goal of government is to protect it's citizens. I am of the opinion, correct me if I am wrong, that if people choose to come together and agree on social services of some kind, then there is nothing wrong with this, according to objectivism. The problem is when Government mandates this, i.e. taking taxes for Social security. People deserve a choice, not everyone will benefit, so not everyone should be forced to contribute. There is a big difference between an inevestment of investment and a donation of sacrifice.

Maybe you could clarify your question in regards to the provision of services and what you mean by private donations

Edit: My above arguement pertains to the definition of donation, not whether they are bad or good

Tettrabyte

Edited by Tettrabyte
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Maybe you could clarify your question in regards to the provision of services and what you mean by private donations
What would be some good examples of services which typically the Goverment recieves payment for at gunpoint, being funded without the need to use force?

I expect all manner of agreements would arise, from businesses creating massive parking complexes (hmm, like they do now) and the roads to access them (if people can't get to your store, they can't shop!), to housing developers building their own roads and then advertising them as part of the value of the houses (convenient to shopping!). The only time you'd probably have to dig in your pockets to build your own road as an individual would be if you wanted to live way out in the country.

Thats a very good response and partly what I was looking for, thankyou! I was intitially having trouble visualising how a system would work as you earlier described.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

What would be some good examples of services which typically the Goverment recieves payment for at gunpoint, being funded without the need to use force?

There are so many examples it's difficult to list them all. Government is involved in virtually every asepct of our lives and almost everything outside of its core duties would be an example. A few are: the National Park System, the Food and Drug Administration, the Department of Education and education funding in general, etc....

Link to comment
Share on other sites

There are so many examples it's difficult to list them all. Government is involved in virtually every asepct of our lives and almost everything outside of its core duties would be an example. A few are: the National Park System, the Food and Drug Administration, the Department of Education and education funding in general, etc...

Appologies if my grammer was unclear, I mean what would be some good examples of services which typically the Goverment recieves payment for at gunpoint, instead being funded without the need to use force? Are there any privately owned roads in the United States for instance?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Are there any privately owned roads in the United States for instance?

There are many privately owned roads, they are called toll roads, which are opperated by independant companies, well not all of them are. The government generally leases them the land or something along those lines ( i forget the specifics) but they own and operate the road. A lot of the social programs should be privatized. But do not confuse this with what Bush is doing, because he is not advocating complete privatization of Social Security. But there are other countries that have done so, and those systems are working quite well.

Tettra

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I think that you can classify some donations as exchanges. One would give to PBS or NPR because they expect to benefit from the programming that the services provide. Now, The horrid Tsunami benefit program that popped up on the television and in many places was an example of donations, where for most there would be no beneficial return.

You cannot classify some donations as exchanges; this is linguistic sloppiness. Either you receive a value in exchange for your value or you do not. If you are funding NPR and PBS because you enjoy them, then you are engaging in an exchange; if you fund them because you think you ought to but would rather not, you are making a donation. The thing to remember is that a value is always a value to someone, so before you can say something was a gift or a trade you have to know the details of what is involved.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Appologies if my grammer was unclear, I mean what would be some good examples of services which typically the Goverment recieves payment for at gunpoint, instead being funded without the need to use force? Are there any privately owned roads in the United States for instance?

The Post Office is another example. In fact, it is a fascinating example for various reasons.

It is not COMPLETELY illegitimate for a government to operate various services under specific conditions; a.) the funding is not obtained via coercion, b.) it is important to the functioning of the government that this particular service exist, and c.) the government service does not compete with any private services.

This is actually how the Post Office came into being. It is vitally important to convey correspondence quickly and efficiently for the operation of any kind of society. Unfortunately it's not always possible to turn a profit by carrying the mail. The Post Office was intended to be self-supporting (it isn't now, it's massively inefficient), charging money to make up its operating costs. However, when competitors arose, a proper government would have quietly phased out the government Post.

GPS is another service that began as a military technology (and the military is one of the legitimate functions of government, after all). Military technology and research is utterly vital. Gradually, as civillian contractors are finding more and more uses for GPS it is being turned more and more into a civilian enterprise, although the military still uses it, of course.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

There are many privately owned roads, they are called toll roads, which are opperated by independant companies, well not all of them are. The government generally leases them the land or something along those lines ( i forget the specifics) but they own and operate the road.

My understanding is that toll roads are government-owned, they allow the maintenance company to collect tolls in order to finance their maintenance projects. In most areas where toll roads exist the taxpayers get hit with a double whammy; the ridiculous gas tax, which is intended to pay for highway infrastructure, AND seperate tolls. The tolls mostly affect those who live in the suburbs and commute to a city; i.e. the middle class.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Appologies if my grammer was unclear, I mean what would be some good examples of services which typically the Goverment recieves payment for at gunpoint, instead being funded without the need to use force? Are there any privately owned roads in the United States for instance?

Oh sorry, I misunderstood. Another example is a private security force. These private guards fill a need that arises when government is incapable of performing one of its core duties.

One more example is a private adoption agency. Many adoptions are handled through state agencies, but some are arranged by private companies in exchange for a fee.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

You cannot classify some donations as exchanges; this is linguistic sloppiness.  Either you receive a value in exchange for your value or you do not.  If you are funding NPR and PBS because you enjoy them, then you are engaging in an exchange; if you fund them because you think you ought to but would rather not, you are making a donation.  The thing to remember is that a value is always a value to someone, so before you can say something was a gift or a trade you have to know the details of what is involved.

My point was that it depends on what your definition of donation is. If your definition involves the idea of exchange, then it is morally acceptable, but if your defintion regards sacrifice, then it is morally wrong. It isn't linguistically sloopy, because many people have different ideas of what a donation is and when it is appropriate to donate. While in truth such a donation would be an exchange, many people will commonly say that it is a donation, when it is in fact an exchange.

In regards to toll roads, many of them are built by the private companies and the only thing the government owns is the land. So they essentially lease the land for a small amount of money and the toll company controls all the rest. But this isn't the case in all toll roads just some. And there might be some that own their land, but I don't know any for sure.

Tettra

Edited by Tettrabyte
Link to comment
Share on other sites

My point was that it depends on what your definition of donation is. If your definition involves the idea of exchange, then it is morally acceptable, but if your defintion regards sacrifice, then it is morally wrong. It isn't linguistically sloopy, because many people have different ideas of what a donation is and when it is appropriate to donate. While in truth such a donation would be an exchange, many people will commonly say that it is a donation, when it is in fact an exchange.

Then it is linguistically sloppy of them, not me. Donation has one and only one definition, it is a gift, and a gift has one and only one definition.

Linguistic sloppiness is permissable in everyday conversation; if you say "I gave money to NPR" people know that you handed over some money to them; there's no reason why they need to know your particular reasons, thinking on the matter, etc.

However, in discussing the ramifications of various ideas, linguistic sloppiness must be avoided in order to distinguish the precise nature of those ideas. If I went around saying "I donated some money to McDonalds today", you would say, "The Ronald McDonald house?" and I would have to clarify, "no, I mean, I bought a cheeseburger". You would be stupefied. So it is inappropriate, in this context, to say that a donation can mean both a gift and an exchange, just because people use it that way in some other situations.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...