Re: CryptoAnarchy: What's wrong with this picture?
Sandy Sandfort wrote:
Income tax is the Godzilla of taxes. It is THE TAX when it comes to the US. (Perhaps VAT has a similar status elsewhere, but both, as pointed out, are subject to crypto-anarchistic subversion.)
...taxes existed, and governments sustained themselves perfectly well, long before these systems arose.
But at nowhere near the voracious levels of modern states.
This is a point I hadn't considered. If the govt doesn't know where most of the money is, they can't "harvest" it nearly as efficiently. Although they will almost certainly try to extract as much as possible from the poor, you can't get blood from a stone. Hence the size of current governments will undoubtedly have to shrink. Most other arguments put forth so far in this thread, about how people "won't stand for" certain government behaviors and so forth, I don't find convincing. Modern military technologies, especially in the U.S., make the prospects of a sucessful popular uprising dubious. When you cut off someone's air supply, even the nicest, gentlest person will go into an unrestrained, murderous frenzy. I expect something similar will happen to even the most "civilized" governments within the next few years, as popular crypto begins to cut off their money supply. As I see it, only those relatively few citizens who can afford to flee will dare to resist. Which brings us to the "flight of capital" issue. Will nations be able to compete freely for the loyalty of the rich? Or will the most powerful nations form effective coalitions, and perhaps simply bomb "rogue" nations into the stone age? The more I contemplate my "simple" question of yesterday, the more I find myself getting into deep waters which I feel ill-equipped to navigate. I rapidly run up against such imponderable questions as, "What is government?" and "What is wealth, really?" Only one thing is certain: We live in interesting times! At any rate, I thank everyone for their thoughtful responses. --- mkj
On Sun, 28 Apr 1996 mkj@october.segno.com wrote: [...]
Most other arguments put forth so far in this thread, about how people "won't stand for" certain government behaviors and so forth, I don't find convincing. Modern military technologies, especially in the U.S., make the prospects of a sucessful popular uprising dubious.
C.f., Chechnya, Afghanistan, Vietnam, Columbia. See Also Generally, various and numerous publications on the successes of low and medium intensity conflict campaigns against modern armies. (Note that I don't think it will come to this in the United States, but your assumption is a faulty one). --- My preferred and soon to be permanent e-mail address:unicorn@schloss.li "In fact, had Bancroft not existed, potestas scientiae in usu est Franklin might have had to invent him." in nihilum nil posse reverti 00B9289C28DC0E55 E16D5378B81E1C96 - Finger for Current Key Information Opp. Counsel: For all your expert testimony needs: jimbell@pacifier.com
One of these days I'm going to learn the art of succint writing. On Sun, 28 Apr 1996 mkj@october.segno.com wrote:
Which brings us to the "flight of capital" issue. Will nations be able to compete freely for the loyalty of the rich? Or will the most powerful nations form effective coalitions, and perhaps simply bomb "rogue" nations into the stone age?
I don't think the rich are really the issue. From what Sandy, Black Unicorn and others write, it looks like those of the rich who are self-employed already play these shell games to a certain extent and a certain amount competition and thumb-screwing already happens. What is interesting is how it applies to the middle-class, where most of the tax-base is. Imagine a world where for cost reasons most offices are VR constructs (a la Snow Crash and all the others) run over the net. Assume that for privacy reasons, nobody in their right minds goes without crypto since any cracker could literally be recording their whole lives. (And assume that this gets built into all the software or the users scream murder as hard as we did when Netscape's CEO looked like he was waffling on GAK.) Assume that some enterprising jurisdictions find some *reliable* means of automating entity creation and use of all the offshore services (creation of companies, trusts, doing financial transactions...) and offer a standard API to these services, making the whole game a commodity and as easy to access as downloading Netscape. Assume that somehow secure pseudonymous financial markets can be created. (Big if, but also big profits) Also assume very low transaction fees as a result. The result of this might be that the netshore economy might actually have lower overhead and an easier interface to its users than the physical world version. If people's easiest intro to economics and the job market is such a simple anarchy and the place where they get most of their entertainment, education and generally spend most of their lives is such an impossible to regulate environment, what do you think this bodes for state control? Or people's desire for it? There is no teacher like experience. Many of us have found it safer to use a pseudonym, sometimes even to save ourselves from occasional embarassment when saying stupid things (nevermind privacy from altavista and whowhere). I think it is natural for people to want such things, especially in a VR environment when anyone can watch you. I assume that in this the cypherpunks, roleplayers, MUD players, political writers and BBSers are not radical but merely slightly ahead of the curve. It is also not a coincidence that pseudonymity keeps getting reinvented in new environments. Basic human need. These games have all been possible for quite some time in the offshore market and seem far more developped. I've read that there are as many registered corporations in the Cayman Islands as there are inhabitants. It might actually be less of a hassle to conduct your business as a corporation than as a individual. Even here in high-tax Canada there are nifty tax benefits (I'm told). Foreign jurisdictions might also be easier to deal with as a corporation (do you *really* want the Chinese government to know that you're doing business with their people? Do you want to get on Saudi Arabia's blacklist?) How do you think most people will act when they learn that just by putting on their glasses they could enter a tax-free jurisdiction with perfect privacy? THIS meme does travel. Now many here think that unless we get chaumian ecash Real Soon Now, none of this will happen. I submit that there will be far more demand for it in the years to come than right now. Anonymous ecash is still several years ahead of its mass-market time. I don't see how in the absence of GAK or any other mandated ID scheme that it will be any easier to stop it (maybe you do). And market share? How can VISA and Microsoft compete against something that lets you save on taxes (why compete *against* it when you can be part of it?). Marketing this is a no-brainer. The only extra expense I can see is that if you're large enough, you might need more accountants to help with your double-booking. (Though maybe you could fire them all if the system is done right) Finally, how will you regulate disputes? Last week we had just this problem. Now imagine how these things will be resolved when real money is involved and force cannot be applied. Arbitration is already "in" in the real world... It's much faster than the average court. What do you think will happen when enough people get exposed to that? Arbitration negotiators (lawyers) might be quite cheaper than real lawyers, after all there's less rules to learn (probably standardized and commoditized) and a global market of them (competition!). Markets can also be set up for transferable lawsuits with greater ease... In sum we're talking about the age of the global small business. As long as you're in the service industry, and you don't deal with physical goods, even if a only few of these things happen, life will be interesting. Ps. Micheal Froomkin disagrees with this. How for example will you escape having your house seized, how will you convince a large institution like his university to pay you as a longterm contractor...? I may be unrealistic, but judging from what is happening to university funding in this country, the increased number of for-credit university courses done by video or TV (Carleton U does 'em), the increased demand for knowledge workers and the increase in small specialty colleges, I'd say he might dean of the www.law.anguila.edu online law school sooner than he thinks. And as for his house, getting "payment" from your "employer" (trust fund/company) only for your expenses is already quite possible and (so it's been said around here) seemingly legal (IANAL!) He might even rent it from some odd offshore real estate company (himself). The only difference compared to now is that it might eventually become alot easier. Thinking of setting up your own universities, folks?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SANDY SANDFORT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . C'punks, On Sun, 28 Apr 1996 s1113645@tesla.cc.uottawa.ca wrote:
I don't think the rich are really the issue. From what Sandy, Black Unicorn and others write, it looks like those of the rich who are self-employed already play these shell games to a certain extent and a certain amount competition and thumb-screwing already happens.
What is interesting is how it applies to the middle-class, where most of the tax-base is.
[He/She then goes on to write a very well thought out analysis of the ramifications of crypto-anarchy.] It used to be that only the rich owned cars, went on cruises or flew in airplanes. Now almost every person of moderate or even modest means can do all three. The same tread can also be seen in the use of offshore techniques. A couple of generations ago, only multinationals and the super rich could avail themselves of offshore banks, asset protection trust, foreign incorporation, etc. Fifteen years ago, I was helping members of the upper middle class do the same think. Today, virtually anyone on this list can afford these techniques. Non-US people have been using them for years. The reason middle class Americans aren't savvy that yet are ignorance and inertia. Everyday, Americans are becoming less parochial (due in part, ironically, to government hysteria about money laundering) about such possibilities. As the Clintons and Doles turn up the tax and regulatory heat, they will also overcome their inertia. Another irony in America is that the lower class seems to be way ahead of the middle class in keeping more of what they earn. Do you think ANY waiter/waitress in the U.S. reports all his/her tips? Do you really think the neighbor who helped you tune up your car last week will pay taxes on what you paid him? Watch where the money goes when you pay for an item in a mom and pop grocery. Sometimes it goes in the till, other times, in the owner's pocket. S a n d y ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Excerpts from internet.cypherpunks: 28-Apr-96 Re: CryptoAnarchy: What's w.. by s1113645@tesla.cc.uottaw
The result of this might be that the netshore economy might actually have lower overhead and an easier interface to its users than the physical world version. If people's easiest intro to economics and the job market is such a simple anarchy and the place where they get most ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ of their entertainment, education and generally spend most of their lives
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
is such an impossible to regulate environment, what do you think this bodes for state control? Or people's desire for it?
This explains far more of the rhetoric on this mailing list than anything I could possibly write: the young libertarians having lived their teenage years alone in their bedrooms listening to heavy metal music or Rush or Sisters of Mercy through headphones in order to not disturb their fathers and masturbating looking at porno pics and imagining the chicks think just like Ayn Rand have now reached the adult stage in which they don't have to use headphones, they can admit they hate their father, they don't have to pay taxes, and they can spend most of their lives in front of a computer. Michael Loomis "Tax Collector Want to Be for the Welfare State"
Excerpts from internet.cypherpunks: 1-May-96 Re: CryptoAnarchy: What's w.. by Michael Loomis@andrew.cm
"Tax Collector Want to Be for the Welfare State"
I can confirm this. Michael and I have had many an argument about taxes. I tend to approach the argument from a libertarian perspective. He, on the other hand, thinks the current tax setup is just about right, and is a fan of the IRS. Not kidding, Declan
On Wed, 1 May 1996, Declan B. McCullagh wrote:
Excerpts from internet.cypherpunks: 1-May-96 Re: CryptoAnarchy: What's w.. by Michael Loomis@andrew.cm
"Tax Collector Want to Be for the Welfare State"
I can confirm this. Michael and I have had many an argument about taxes. I tend to approach the argument from a libertarian perspective.
He, on the other hand, thinks the current tax setup is just about right, and is a fan of the IRS.
I must assume either 1) He is not intimately familiar with the system of U.S. taxation (even if he is pro-high-tax, calling the current system 'just about right' is folly). 2) He believes it important to have a confusing and inefficent tax system for some other reason. I always tell people who feel tax avoidance is "bad" and that using the rules to minimize your tax exposure is a bad thing that I can easily structure their finances such that 90% of their net income goes to the IRS every year and still not break any rules.
Not kidding,
Declan
--- My preferred and soon to be permanent e-mail address:unicorn@schloss.li "In fact, had Bancroft not existed, potestas scientiae in usu est Franklin might have had to invent him." in nihilum nil posse reverti 00B9289C28DC0E55 E16D5378B81E1C96 - Finger for Current Key Information Opp. Counsel: For all your expert testimony needs: jimbell@pacifier.com
At 7:05 AM -0400 5/3/96, Michael Loomis wrote:
No tax system will ever been perfect, but income taxation is a good system of taxation. Income taxation inevitably requires some accounting costs, but these costs should be going down with advances in computing technology and other technology.
Cashflow taxation, like the income tax, is a good *industrial* system of taxation. It operates very well in the hierarchical communications network of an industrial economy, especially in a world of expensive automated processors. It favors unsecure transactions on secure, closed networks. SWIFT (the interbank funds transfer system), NASDAQ (the "over-the-counter" equity market system), and NIDS (the old National Institutional Delivery System, where institutional trades were settled), are all just closed networks, "clubs" as Eric Hughes calls them. Expensive bulletin boards. However, in a world of ubiquitous, exponentially increasing semiconductor switches of financial information, all using strong cryptography on geodesic public networks, you get the virtual end of intercompany book-entry transaction processing. Instead of swapping book-entries across secure links, economic entities will eventually trade using anonymous digital bearer certificates across insecure links, usually in an auction market of some kind, settling all of their transactions for cash at the time of the transaction. It's economics, actually. As Moore's law progresses, the size of a given economic entity, especially the financial intermediaries responsible for underwriting and clearing certificates, gets increasingly smaller, until someday it's an automated bot of some kind. At the same time, the cost of maintaining a spaghetti-bowl of audit trails between all of those entities becomes increasingly harder to sustain, and not just in computing resources. It's also in time value of money. You collect the time value of your money while it's "in transit": while it's actually sitting in your bank account waiting to be paid to the other party of a trade. Unpaid bills, check float, and unrevolved monthly credit card balances are all good examples of this. As financial entities get smaller, more ubiquitous, and more competitive, margins shrink and this becomes much more important. Kind of like gravity and mass. Insignificant at one size, virtually the only force at the other extreme of the scale. Because it settles instantly, without any float, cash literally becomes king in this environment. All of this is just as well. Strong cryptography makes the point moot. Not only do you have internet-level anonymizing protocols, but you also have the certificate protocols themselves. You can't know who you're doing business with, anyway. When you don't have book-entries (cashflows) to tax, you can't tax book-entries, which means nation-states can't have income, value-added, sales, excise, import, export, or any other transaction tax, because they just can't see any of those transactions behind a wall of strong cryptography. Fortunately, the nice thing about these certificate-based technologies is that as they become more prevalent, the need for nation-states to apply force to guarantee the honesty of the trading parties diminishes. The need for force doesn't go away; physical security is always necessary, just like air is. However, it is no longer so necessary to use it to deal with repudiated trades in a large number of markets, especially those for money and information. At the transaction level, the protocol breaks if the requisite conditions of the transaction aren't met. At the relationship level, if someone repudiates a trade, they can be shunned. As Moore's law collapses the size of the trades themselves, the abundance of competing entities in a given certificate-based market reduces the risk of repudiation point-failure in that market effectively to zero. Which means, you don't have to pay Uncle to keep trading partners honest anymore. Which, as we saw before, is a good thing, because you couldn't find them, anyway. ;-). Given that the modern nation-state is a hierarchical industrial organization anyway, -- a literal "force trust", to misapropriate ninteenth century parlance -- it seems that its inability to finance itself in a geodesic market seems inevitable. Competitive markets for all the services it performs will eventually emerge. We live in interesting times. Cheers, Bob Hettinga ----------------- Robert Hettinga (rah@shipwright.com) e$, 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA "If they could 'just pass a few more laws', we would all be criminals." --Vinnie Moscaritolo The e$ Home Page: http://thumper.vmeng.com/pub/rah/
Excerpts from internet.cypherpunks: 2-May-96 Re: CryptoAnarchy: What's w.. by Black Unicorn@schloss.li
I must assume either
1) He is not intimately familiar with the system of U.S. taxation (even if he is pro-high-tax, calling the current system 'just about right' is folly).
No tax system will ever been perfect, but income taxation is a good system of taxation. Income taxation inevitably requires some accounting costs, but these costs should be going down with advances in computing technology and other technology. The goal should be to minimize these costs. I would further suggest it is remarkably childish to think that a political system will not cause some unfairness in the tax code, because it is the nature of democracy to generate some unfairness. As long as the unfairness is kept within reasonable bounds as in the case of the 1986 tax reform, I don't see that this unfairness as a killing objection to income taxation. Of course, unlike most of the readership of this list, I believe that democracy is a good thing. The one concession that I will make is the possibility that crypto technologies could make income taxation an adventure in unfairness and ultimately futility. While, I prefer income taxation, VATs or sales taxes are an acceptable subsitute and one can certainly run a reasonable sized government on them. Outside of crypto-cyber-carrots, I have strong doubts that crypto of any form or sophistication will be able to circumvent consumption taxation. Consumption taxation would, of course, include a tax on the amount of information coming into your computer. I don't think that the government will have any problem determining the quantity of the information & since it will be encrypted anyway, I don't see the privacy worries. Michael Loomis "La haine de l'autorite' est le fle'au de nos jours." Joseph de Maistre
On Fri, 3 May 1996, Michael Loomis wrote:
circumvent consumption taxation. Consumption taxation would, of course, include a tax on the amount of information coming into your computer. I don't think that the government will have any problem determining the quantity of the information & since it will be encrypted anyway, I don't see the privacy worries.
Traffic analysis (though remailers would help). And what about mailbombing? If you're mailbombed, does your tax bill skyrocket? I think information has to be free (of tax, anyway), because there is no way to prove the utlility of information. -rich
"Rich" == Rich Graves <llurch@networking.stanford.edu> writes:
On Fri, 3 May 1996, Michael Loomis wrote:
circumvent consumption taxation. Consumption taxation would, of course, include a tax on the amount of information coming into your computer. I don't think that the government will have any problem determining the quantity of the information & since it will be encrypted anyway, I don't see the privacy worries.
What a wonderful idea! Everybody would Win with this. Rich> Traffic analysis (though remailers would help). What do you have to hide? Rich> And what about mailbombing? If you're mailbombed, does your tax bill Rich> skyrocket? Of course. The Government is much wiser at spending your money than you are. Since most mailbombing can be source blocked, the funds raised from a mailbombing can be used on a Federal Training program for computer administrators because you obviously cannot take care of yourself. Sites with mailing lists are not exempt, neither are Usenet sites. The user fees can be raised to pay the taxes. Mailing lists shouldn't be free anyway. The Usenet Oracle will be taxed too. It's too dangerous for a site to be giving out free advice without some kind of Government Regulation. Rich> I think information has to be free (of tax, anyway), because there is no Rich> way to prove the utlility of information. It doesn't matter. It's a conspiracy by Netscape and Microsoft. Since taxation will be based on volume of information it follows logically that browsing the web with Lynx or images turned off is income tax evasion. (Using gzip for FTP is also tax evasion). It's your duty as a law-abiding taxpaying citizen-unit to Pay Your Fair Share, and that means browsing the Web with Netscape with all the extensions turned on. Be patriotic! Put lots of 100k GIFs on your Home Page to Reduce The Deficit! Browse the WWW with Netscape for America! Don't do it for yourself, Do It For Your Children; their future is at stake. Microsoft is feeling threatened on its own turf by people FTPing free Unix instead of paying big bucks for broken software. What's good for Microsoft is Good For America. Let's keep American Jobs At Home. We can't have some upstart foreigner in Finland putting an honest American company to shame. FTP file transfers of Linux must be taxed. Just to be fair, this tax ought to apply to everyone in the world. Why should taxpaying American citizens have to pay the US government to visit Yahoo when people in Europe get to see it for free? Level the playing field. - The Unix Cypherpunk
On Fri, 3 May 1996, Michael Loomis wrote:
Excerpts from internet.cypherpunks: 2-May-96 Re: CryptoAnarchy: What's w.. by Black Unicorn@schloss.li
I must assume either
1) He is not intimately familiar with the system of U.S. taxation (even if he is pro-high-tax, calling the current system 'just about right' is folly).
No tax system will ever been perfect, but income taxation is a good system of taxation.
Bear in mind that the current system imposes more than just income tax and that the United States, unlike most other countries, taxes worldwide income and compensates with an immensely complicated foreign tax credit system.
Income taxation inevitably requires some accounting costs, but these costs should be going down with advances in computing technology and other technology. The goal should be to minimize these costs.
Accounting costs as a result of income taxation do not bother me. Accounting costs as a result of a deduction based, multi-tiered, progressive, and supplimented system of income taxation are silly. The income tax system in the United States has been driven since the post war period by the effort to implement policy through the congress' power to tax rather then the simple need for funds. Allowing special interest groups to drive a system of taxation is hardly fitting the goal of "minimizing these costs." The income tax system in the United States thus fails even your test. Exercise for the reader: How many de fact laws are implemented by an tax which would be unconstitutional to pass directly?
I would further suggest it is remarkably childish to think that a political system will not cause some unfairness in the tax code, because it is the nature of democracy to generate some unfairness.
I don't recall ever asserting this.
As long as the unfairness is kept within reasonable bounds as in the case of the 1986 tax reform, I don't see that this unfairness as a killing objection to income taxation.
Then the issue that divides us is the definition of fairness.
Of course, unlike most of the readership of this list, I believe that democracy is a good thing.
That's a pretty arrogant (and fairly incorrect) assumption. [...]
sized government on them. Outside of crypto-cyber-carrots, I have strong doubts that crypto of any form or sophistication will be able to circumvent consumption taxation.
Sorry, I just don't agree with you here. If black markets exist, even florish, without crypto, how exactly is it that you think they will not be easier to run and maintain and shield from discovery in the presence of encryption? The amount of resources which would have to be dedicated to tax compliance enforcement under your scheme would be staggering. I don't doubt that taxation (if it comes to this) will go down kicking and screaming, but if you can think of a way to regulate offshore markets in information futures without invading the country hosting the exchange (note that there is a case that even this can be defended against by the market) I'd like to hear it.
Consumption taxation would, of course, include a tax on the amount of information coming into your computer. I don't think that the government will have any problem determining the quantity of the information & since it will be encrypted anyway, I don't see the privacy worries.
You don't see the privacy worries in mandating data providers to count bits and report to a central authority on their findings? It's clear you're unconvertable. We should take this discussion (if it continues) to e-mail. --- My preferred and soon to be permanent e-mail address:unicorn@schloss.li "In fact, had Bancroft not existed, potestas scientiae in usu est Franklin might have had to invent him." in nihilum nil posse reverti 00B9289C28DC0E55 E16D5378B81E1C96 - Finger for Current Key Information Opp. Counsel: For all your expert testimony needs: jimbell@pacifier.com
Oh god, I'd doomed. I think I am gonna wind up on Mr. Bells side in this one. Please also note that I am cc:ing this to an individual who is both more knowlegable about certain aspects of the following, and interested in certain aspects of this. On Sun, 28 Apr 1996 mkj@october.segno.com wrote:
Sandy Sandfort wrote:
Income tax is the Godzilla of taxes. It is THE TAX when it comes to the US. (Perhaps VAT has a similar status elsewhere, but both,
Most other arguments put forth so far in this thread, about how people "won't stand for" certain government behaviors and so forth, I don't find convincing. Modern military technologies, especially in the U.S., make the prospects of a sucessful popular uprising dubious.
I strongly disagree with this. (Especially within the US) Modern Military technology doesn't have a lot to do with it. It is modern stratagies and tactics that make things difficult. In a "popular uprising" (in quotes because most aren't) an organized armed group will devistate(spelling?) a mob, and the technology necessary to do this is at least 30 years old. Fine. So change the tactics. Instead of "Rising Up", simply use an ages old an respected solution. Take out the leaders. Note, I am _not_ suggesting Mr. Bells assination politics, rather, given a violent revolution, or the beginings of one, shorten it by taking those who make the policies you disagree with. The things is, you HAVE to wait until the violence breaks out, and you HAVE to do the job quickly, and take out as much of the leadership as possible, otherwise your job gets much more dificult. I am digressing. My point is not to advocate such actions, only to argue that it isn't the TECHNOLOGY that is the problem, rather the strategy.
When you cut off someone's air supply, even the nicest, gentlest person will go into an unrestrained, murderous frenzy. I expect something similar will happen to even the most "civilized" governments within the next few years, as popular crypto begins to cut off their money supply. As I see it, only those relatively few citizens who can afford to flee will dare to resist.
As a suggestion, and using your analogy, wouldn't it be better to either a) drug the person you are strangling so they don't notice, or to simply break their neck? (I.e. make it so they don't notice they are strangling until it is too late, if ever, or to do it so quickly that they don't have time to react? In this case I think the second would be the most difficult.
Which brings us to the "flight of capital" issue. Will nations be able to compete freely for the loyalty of the rich? Or will the most powerful nations form effective coalitions, and perhaps simply bomb "rogue" nations into the stone age?
You might want to take a look at http://lois.kud-fp.si/nsk. (Note, you must use a graphical browser) Has this been discussed before? This Nation/State called Neue Slowenische Kunst is issuing passports to anyone who is a citizen. Citizenship is confered (apparently) on anyone who is willing to agree to their "constitution". These passports are being accepted (apparently, tho' I couldn't find the list of counties that accept them.) I disagree quite strongly with MANY of the rules/laws that their constituion establishes, but the idea interests me. New Slovenia isn't a (at this point my command of the language breaks down, or maybe there isn't an exact word for it) State. Basically, it is a Nation without borders, where citizenship is a matter of allegence rather than geographical location/birth. I don't know a whole lot about it, as those particular pages are entirely GIFs, and I am not a patient person. It got me to thinking (yeah, you probably saw the smoke). The idea that citizenship--or whatever it would be called--is based on things other than nationality (although NSK is a nationalist organization) is not new, but with (Cypherpunk tie in) the ability for people to communicate freely across borders, would it be possible set up something similar along other lines? /* Semantic Note: from this point on in this ramble, Nation will be used to describe a political entity based on philosphical allegance ala NSK, and State will be used to describe a geographically based political entity */ It would be relatively easy to set up, but recognition/validity would be a major difficulty (Understatement). Convincing others as to the necessity would be damn near impossible tho'. (I am starting to think of many many more obsticles. Law enforcement etc) The major advantage would be the impossibility of convention (or nuclear) attack. Simply, no land, nothing for a military to take and hold. Then agression against this posited nation would either devolve into police actions on known "citizens" and/or economic "warfare". Economic warfare would take place against National banks (ala a digital cash type system) by States refusing to allow certain National banks to convert currency in their jurisdiction. etc. The intersting possiblity lies in the taxiation realm. As it becomes easier and easier to hide income via anonymity, these Nations or at least their bank[s] could act as arbiters/agents in taxation, paying the states for services rendered based on their population in a given state. Another possiblity: Seperation of Powers, the States deal with physical matters such as roads, parks etc. operating on Service based taxes (gas taxes for roads, entrance fees for Parks etc. VAT to pay for police & fire depts) and the Nations take care of economic interests such as financial security currency exchange etc. I think I am going to be thinking about this for a while.
The more I contemplate my "simple" question of yesterday, the more I find myself getting into deep waters which I feel ill-equipped to navigate. I rapidly run up against such imponderable questions as, "What is government?" and "What is wealth, really?" Only one thing is certain: We live in interesting times!
Are these the deep waters you refer to?
participants (10)
-
Black Unicorn -
Declan B. McCullagh -
Michael Loomis -
mkj＠october.segno.com -
Rich Graves -
Robert Hettinga -
s1113645＠tesla.cc.uottawa.ca -
Sandy Sandfort -
Snow -
The Unix Cypherpunk