Kevin Graham wrote:Exactly, which proves the point that you're full of crap when you suggest anyone could forgo public law enforcement and pay for private security at a cheaper rate than what they pay in taxes.
We are talking about what hypothetically could be done if the state didn't provide that service, not what is possible in an environment where the government can and will use its full police-state powers to prevent that service from existing.
Even if you hired a private security guard, the amount you'd have to pay him to literally live with you and guard you and your 24-7, would be easily in the six figure range. (No, I'm not saying that's what public law enforcement does, but their constant "stand by" status within close distance has that same effect).
I do not understand why you do not get that people could pool their resources to pay for a 24/7 force with a coverage ratio of police similar to what is currently offered in various areas of the country. This cost would be significantly less than the price of having a personal security guard. My city, one of the safest in the country, has a police per capita ratio of 18.6 for every 10,000 people. That's slightly less than 1 officer for every 1 person.
There aren't examples of true private police systems in the U.S. because private police systems are illegal in the U.S. Mind you, I think this is a proper function of the state. That's not the point. The point is getting a sense of what the cost of such a system would be if it was offered via an insurance/co-op scheme. It's as though you have forgotten that you are trying to compare what ajax receives in services from the state against what he pays into the state.
You entered this discussion trolling. You know this.
I entered this discussion to point out that an assertion you made that you said only an epic moron would disagree with is, in fact, false. That's not trolling. I'm not adopting a ridiculous stance to get a rise out of you. I am pointing out you are wrong. Disagreeing with you isn't "trolling." I'm not sure you know what trolling actually is.
I don't need to to explain to me WHY costs are so low with government services. I already know that costs are spread across hundreds of millions of people. That's the whole point of having a mandate. The debate here isn't whether or not the private sector could be cheaper at some future point. The debate here is about whether or not someone COULD, right NOW, stop paying taxes and receive the SAME SERVICES from the private sector at a CHEAPER rate.
That answer is a flat NO. And only a moron would say otherwise.
So if the government took over the toy manufacturing industry and its ancillary means of production, then made it illegal with heavy criminal sanctions for any private entity to produce toys, you think you would be making a clever point if you said, "No one, anywhere can produce toys more cheaply than the government. If you think otherwise, point to examples where people are doing it you epic morons!" Uh, comrade, that's only the case because the government is crowding out competitors with the force of law. That doesn't speak to what is actually possible if they weren't doing that. If the government is charging us 1 thousand dollars a year for our toy ration, to find out if we are getting more in toy wealth than what we are paying in, market pricing matters. You might be eager to demand ajax thank his lucky stars The Party provides him with his yearly toy ration that is much cheaper than he could get on the highly illegal black market, but it really misses the point about what kind of service he is receiving for his dollar given that he is on the very high end of tax burden.
By the way, you still don't seem to understand that services like trash disposal, roads, fire, police, etc. can spread costs across huge amounts of people without mandatory taxes. If the justification for the government's role in those services was exclusively its need to pool resources to bring them about, it would be a failed justification.