Why should anyone have more money than anyone else?

[wordspeak2]

I suspect that much of the "laziness" we see in our society is a subconscious expression of rebellion against an inherently unjust social order. Are there people who will sit back and take advantage of the hard work of others no matter what kind of society they live in? Of course there are. But I really don't believe they are the majority. Most people will actively look for things to do in order to keep themselves from going crazy. Inactivity runs just as counter to our instinctual drives as does toiling day-in day-out.[/quote]

You know, I essentially agree with that. Fuck "Tragedy of the Commons." I read Michael Parenti's take on eastern bloc communist societies from spending time there... and he did find a fair amount of people being lazy because things were guaranteed, but not as much as one might expect. Of course, there were some people who worked harder than others, etc. But I say let's have a government that runs a mass weed-growing and other psychoactive plant production, and everyone in society is guaranteed minimal food, housing, and weed. People who want more beyond the minimal can work for it, but you won't see so much negativity and competition if everybody's high. And I don't think anybody should be starving or freezing to death, no matter how lazy you are. But I think you'll see a lot less apathy under a mass pot-production system and if you take away the current subsidized system, which is for CIA heroin and coke, as well as pharmaceuticals. I know some people who conservatives would have a field day with calling them pathetic sloths living off of the nanny state... and there's some truth to it. But, the fact is, they've been completely fucked up on psych drugs. Get them off of that shit and experiencing positive states of consciousness, and I think you'll find very few people who don't want to be positive and contribute. The super-rich of today, yes. There will need to still be jails for people like the Bushes and Hitlers of the world. But does there need to be money, per se? I'm not sure. Maybe- I'm open to it. But it may be beside the point. Kick out the evil people from power. Put in good people. Most folks are actually good and decent, and remarkably so, given the mind control drugs and chemicals we live under. Start a mass-subsidized weed program, "pay" growers well, support cutting-edge research projects in other plant healing areas, and I think most of the pettiness and competition will subside. As Bill Hicks said- "We could explore space together forever!"

[undead]

Yeah, all that stuff sounds really great. It would also be really great if there could be a more equitable society. One thing is for sure, bitching about how some people have more than others doesn't help. At all. It's just not productive.

As far as freeloading is concerned, I agree that most people who are considered lazy are in fact rebelling against pointless work, and good for them. But there are some people who freeload. There always have been, and there probably always will be. That is why an egalitarian society that functions will never be able to give everyone exactly the same share.

Look at the phrase "From each according to his ability, to each according to his need." In an ideal society, where everyone works for the benefit of the whole, people who do more work would require more resources to do that. That is a fact. Some jobs are more difficult to do, requiring more energy and higher compensation. Not a huge extra amount, only an appropriate amount so that the person is able to do the job. For example, learning to be a doctor requires a person to receive more resources than learning to be a sanitation worker. Working as a doctor requires more resources than being a sanitation worker. It is in the interest of everyone that doctors receive more compensation than sanitation workers.

Insisting that everyone receive exactly the same compensation for whatever job they do is ridiculous. It is unrealistic, and shows that the people who espouse this view are not at all concerned with working to implement such a society, because if they were they would see that this kind of abstract bullshit gets in the way of making things happen in reality. And that is a big reason why these kinds of societies rarely ever happen outside of intellectual hot air balloons.

[tazmic]

In an ideal society, where everyone works for the benefit of the whole.

Do you think it is possible for 'everyone's work to benefit the whole' without 'everyone working for the benefit of the whole'? (Tragedy of the Commons?)

"Working as a doctor requires more resources than being a sanitation worker."

Of course.

"It is in the interest of everyone that doctors receive more compensation than sanitation workers."

Compensation, or resources? Isn't getting to be a Doctor compensation enough?

"Insisting that everyone receive exactly the same compensation for whatever job they do is ridiculous."

Indeed, I'd expect a sanitary worker to want some compensation.

[undead]

Compensation, or resources? Isn't getting to be a Doctor compensation enough?

No, not at all. Being a doctor is a nice job because you get paid a lot. If you don't get paid more, what is left? You spend your entire life listening to sick people complain, your job is one of the most difficult, and you are often subjected to the stress of having another person's life in your hands. Yes there are many doctors who do the job because they love helping people, but even they will tell you that it takes huge amounts of energy to do the job, and that it would be impossible to do it for free. Even the doctors without borders people probably have more than the average person.

Instead of hating on people who have more than others, people should be more concerned with whether or not those people are using their advantageous position to help the collective good. And if they aren't, they should have their shit taken away in order to use it in a more productive way. But if someone is doing really important work, and happens to have more than the average person, they don't deserve to get hated on. And that happens a lot. And it sucks.

[undead]

I thought of yet another answer to the OP:

There are some people who are fucked up and shouldn't have anything at all beyond bare essentials - like war criminals, child rapists, and all of the scum who really deserve to be locked up. Those people should have less than people who don't fuck up the world for everyone else. In an ideal world, where these people were prevented from continuing their bullshit, everyone else would be free to multiply and be fruitful, and they would create a more abundant existence than living in prison cell.

[barracuda]

You know, undead, I agree with almost everything you've said there except this part:

"For example, learning to be a doctor requires a person to receive more resources than learning to be a sanitation worker. Working as a doctor requires more resources than being a sanitation worker. It is in the interest of everyone that doctors receive more compensation than sanitation workers."

Your statements here have any number of assumptions built into them that need to be dismantled.

When I read that, my first thought is "Why?" Why does a doctor's training require more resources than that of a sanitation worker? If you examine the requirements for a pre-med student, you'll find that most of the suggested courses are entirely applicable to the field of sanitation work as well, such as physics, organic and inorganic chemistry, and biological sciences. But realistically, many medical schools will consider an applicant with just aboout any undergraduate major, as long as they have a high GPA and score well on the MCAT. And medical school itself is simply further specialized study of the workings of the human body and basic medicine for two years, followed by two years on rotation essentially as an apprentice. Sanitation workers must pass through any number of levels of apprenticeship to work in the more complex aspects of their field as well.

Do you really think the practice of your average doctor is more intellectually difficult than designing, implementing and maintaining your typical municipal waste plant or industrial waste outflow? If sanitation work had equally stringent training requirements, perhaps the problems of municipal or industrial pollution would wind up being systematically addressed by highly competent experts on an ongoing basis. As well, the presumptive stigma associated with sanitation work would quickly disappear. What we need is an understanding of these problems by highly trained persons from the ground up, but instead the problems of pollution caused by the waste products of industrial processes are allowed and ignored.

Yes, there are specialised doctors, or surgeons, whose training and skill set is highly refined. There are equally challenging aspects of waste control, though, calling for novel and complex solutions on a planetary scale. Is the cure for cancer more important than the cure for, say, river pollution? I'd say the two problems may be inextricably tied together.

And why do you assume that working as a doctor requires more resources than working in sanitation? A typical GP is seeing a patient one-on-one. He doesn't require a fully equipt truck to do his job, like a sanitation worker might. A municipal hospital may have a wide variety of expensive equipment, but no more expensive than that of a municipal waste or water treatment plant, and the attendant infrastructure required to keep a city or a factory clean. But the truth is, people care if their toe hurts far more than they care about the effect their lives have upon their surroundings.

It is in the interest of everyone that the sanitation of our world is addressed on a level at least as fundamental and ongoing and specialized as the doctoring of your toe is. But it is not, at least partly because of meaningless class distinctions. If our new world is going to be composed of vocational caste systems mirroring those of our old world, I'd say it is hardly worth engaging.

[undead]

Actually, I was referring to garbage collectors when I said sanitation workers. The people you are talking about would usually be called civil and environmental engineers. And yes, my mistake for not being more specific.

As far as the vocational caste system is concerned, I agree that it is not desirable, but unfortunately human beings are born with varying degrees of ability. This is a biological fact, no matter how much people try to blame it on socialization and inequality. Even if a perfectly equitable system were implemented tomorrow, everyone would not be born equal.

So like you said before, there are some people who are suited to performing menial jobs. That doesn't mean that they should be paid exactly the same as people who do difficult, complex jobs that require a high level of skill. I think that it is enough to say that people should be compensated in a way that corresponds to how much the contribute to the collective good. Some people contribute more to society than others, and in order for them to be justly compensated for their work they might need to get a little more than others.

[Wombaticus Rex]

Vocational Caste systems reflect hard biological realities. Our brains simply don't have the bandwidth for us to be a species of self-contained Supermensch. I don't see any way around that "problem" that doesn't involve science fiction and end with us being something other than human beings.

[undead]

If we can agree that the world would be better off without money, then the question in the OP becomes pretty meaningless. Here's an answer: people who care about helping others should have more money than people who are selfish and self-absorbed. I volunteer for a nonprofit that works to build a barter exchange economy, and we need money in order to operate, so it would be nice if we got some of the money that goes to all the bullshit capitalistic microloan charities, or the so called christian ones where the administrators get paid obscene amounts of money.

[lyrimal]

How about everybody rotates between skilled and unskilled work, where everybody has equal rights to becoming skilled. Doctors could be janitors or miners for one or two days a week...

Personally, I've been stewing for some time on the idea of a socialist-capitalist society where no women or man works for another. To work for any company would require some equitable share of partnership in the company, calculated by years of education/work-experience...

[undead]

How about everybody rotates between skilled and unskilled work, where everybody has equal rights to becoming skilled. Doctors could be janitors or miners for one or two days a week...

Because some people are exceptionally talented and it benefits everyone to have them doing what they do best all the time? Remember equal rights to becoming skilled does not guarantee that everyone will become skilled. But I know what you mean, and it would be good to have some kind of rotation scheme for certain jobs. For example, having worked with severely mentally disabled people I think that no person should do this job full time, because it is psychologically damaging and often causes people to become callous and bitter, which in turn hurts the people they take care of. Caretakers should at least get a significant vacation in order to rest, because that kind of work can really make you insane, literally.

Also I think administration and other jobs that attract the power-hungry should be on a rotational basis. O wait, we're supposed to have something like that already, aren't we?

[N8wide]

Exactly why? (Please specify.)

Motivation. I would have no motivation to pay for the schooling and the sacrifice of time to be an engineer or a doctor, if I was being paid the same as someone flipping burgers at McDonalds.

[barracuda]

Actually, I was referring to garbage collectors when I said sanitation workers. The people you are talking about would usually be called civil and environmental engineers. And yes, my mistake for not being more specific.

In a similar vein, then, I would posit that garbage collecting as a task is woefully neglected in terms of the training and technology needed to actually do the job right, and again, mostly because people don't care about their garbage as long as it isn't on their front step. I think the existence of the Pacific trash gyre is a fine testament to the truth of this statement. We need to re-think garbage collecting.

As far as the vocational caste system is concerned, I agree that it is not desirable, but unfortunately human beings are born with varying degrees of ability. This is a biological fact, no matter how much people try to blame it on socialization and inequality. Even if a perfectly equitable system were implemented tomorrow, everyone would not be born equal.

Varyiing degrees of ability to do ... what, exactly? Yes, intellectuals may make poor trash collectors (or maybe not!), so they are ill-suited to a profession which, to my way of thinking, is more important to the health of the planet than any number of intellectual pursuits, up to and including doctoring.

So like you said before, there are some people who are suited to performing menial jobs.

I don't really believe, personally, that there is such an animal as a "menial" job. Within the breadth of every task or profession there exists a spectrum of tasks all of which need to be optimally performed. Each of these tasks are interdependant. There is no one ill-suited to simply perform tasks optimally in the proper setting.

Vocational Caste systems reflect hard biological realities.

Ideas about "biological realities" are what created negro slavery, the burakumin, and the Dalits.

I would have no motivation to pay for the schooling and the sacrifice of time to be an engineer or a doctor, if I was being paid the same as someone flipping burgers at McDonalds.

You might, though, if the cost of such training wasn't debilitating, and the financial rewards were roughly equivalent. You'd wind up motivated to study what you loved and attempt to approach a mastery of it. That's what people do in almost every field of endeavor anyway, but unlike medicine, most fields don't have the artificially expensive codified educational requirements that medicine does. Do we really need entire generations of doctors who entered the field for no reason other than its financial reward?

[Wombaticus Rex]

"Your argument has been misused before, therefore it is invalid."

Sorry, can't buy that for a second. We'd have nothing to talk about if that was actually logic.

[undead]

Ideas about "biological realities" are what created negro slavery, the burakumin, and the Dalits.

You're being inane now.

For example: many people are severely mentally disabled. This is a biological reality. They basically don't contribute anything at all to society at large, and they are kept alive only out of the kindness and sympathy of others. I have worked in a situation in which the disabled people I was taking care of received more in public assistance than their caretakers received in wages. This was a terrible situation for them, because they were technically considered independent individuals, so their caretakers could not stop them from wasting their money in ways that were extremely detrimental to their health, not to mention abusing the system.

So that's another reason why some people should have more money than other people.

Human beings are not created equal in all aspects. Not even close. I personally believe that all human beings have the potential to be enlightened and fulfill their unique potential, but that doesn't mean that everyone has the same potential. The world is not perfect and fair. To suggest such a thing suggests an extreme separation from reality, or a personal inferiority complex, or just envy of those who have better luck.

edit to add:

WR, your statement that vocational caste systems reflect hard biological realities is not entirely accurate. I know what you were getting at, and "vocational caste system" was an exaggeration. But you need to be careful while we're splitting hairs on the atomic level, otherwise the argument will go on forever until everyone forgets what we were originally talking about.