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PaperclipPerfector  9mo ago (text post)   3204 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for July 16, 2023

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

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I recently read this article, which seems to have awoken some latent bleeding heart in me. As a result, it’s got me thinking about wealth redistribution, whence the following questions:

  • What are some of the best “utilitarian” arguments against greater wealth redistribution in America? (When I say “utilitarian”, I don’t actually mean calculating out the utils involved— but I do mean arguments other than moral ones like “people ought be able to retain the results of their labor” (which argument I am particularly sympathetic to around tax season).) What are estimates of the argmax of the Laffer curve? Is there an inverse relationship between “innovation” and income tax rate that might explain why America is far more of a tech hub than Sweden? That sort of argument is what I would be looking for.
  • Are there any low-overhead charities out there where you can mostly-directly send money to poorer people? Preferably with options to filter by criteria such as number of kids, marital status, etc.

I understand that this post betrays a real naïveté in both economic knowledge and worldly experience— so I’ll admit that I’m a decent bit embarrassed about making it, but I figure that a Small-Scale Question Sunday thread is the best place to ask this.

but I do mean arguments other than moral ones like “people ought be able to retain the results of their labor”

Because societies where people aren't able to retain the results of their labor soon start to have toilet paper shortages, proceed to one half of the population putting the other half into gulags, and then the society collapses? Of course, the true wealth redistribution have been never tried. But the results of the wrong ones so far are not encouraging. Of course, pointing to taking $10 from Bill Gates and giving it to this hungry kid is easy. But once you try to make a system out of it, it somehow all ends up in no toilet paper and the hungry kid remains as hungry as before.

Are there any low-overhead charities out there where you can mostly-directly send money to poorer people?

All the national orgs I've used to donate over the years recently gone woke and I stopped trusting them. Probably a local charity would be the best bet. Would be happy to be proven wrong (though really no need if the local charity is enough).

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