The Duty to Give Away Everything You Don't Need
Many moral philosophies seem to imply a duty to give away everything you don’t need. Consider this statement by Nicole Hassoun over at Cato Unbound:
I do not have property rights that extend so far that they allow me to withhold essential goods that I do not need from those who will suffer and die without them.
In a follow-up, though, Hassoun denied that this commits her to the view that she has a moral duty to give away all her surplus wealth:
[W]hile I think that the current distribution of property rights globally is very unjust because it leaves people unable to meet their basic needs, I do not believe the best way of addressing the problem is through individual action.
I beg to differ. Given some highly probable empirical assumptions, Hassoun’s position does indeed require her to donate all her surplus wealth to the global poor. In my latest post, I spell out the argument:
1. Hassoun does not have property rights that extend so far that they allow her to withhold essential goods that she does not need from those who will suffer and die without them. [Hassoun’s original premise, with “Hassoun” instead of “I.”]
2. People in the Third World are now suffering and dying due to lack of essential goods. [Certainly a true empirical claim.]
3. Third World suffering and dying will persist even if Hassoun takes all actions in her power other than massive personal financial donation, such as voting, political activism, blogging, and teaching. [An extremely probable empirical claim, given that Hassoun is only one person in a world of seven billion.]
4. Hassoun has essential goods (namely money) that she does not need. [An extremely probable empirical claim, given that she works as a professor in the First World, and First World professors earn far more than subsistence.]
5. People in the Third World will suffer and die if Hassoun withholds these essential goods. [An extremely probable empirical claim, given the existence of dire poverty and effective international charities.]
6. Therefore, Hassoun does not have property rights that allow her to withhold essential goods she does not need. In plain English, she has a moral obligation to donate all her surplus wealth to people in dire poverty. [From #1-#5.]
Of course, dire poverty will persist even if Hassoun does donate all the wealth she does not need. But her principle does not require her to end world poverty. It merely requires her to give away everything she does not need until dire poverty no longer exists.
While we’re on this topic, can’t you use the same kind of logic to argue that every libertarian who works for the government should resign? It depends. If the libertarian’s view is something like, “Every government employee is guilty of robbery,” then sure. But a libertarian could easily claim that the only a narrow subset of government employees (e.g. tax collectors, judges who try tax cases, and politicians who vote for taxes) are guilty of robbery. Other government employees might even legitimately claim that they’re victims recovering a fraction of the damages the government owes them for past and ongoing wrongs.
The post appeared first on Econlib.
Stuff we don't need? What if our wealth is ownership of investments that help businesses to run, keeping people employed and out of poverty? What about keepsakes that have no value to anyone else?
This idea embraces the fundamental error that value is a property of things, rather than a relationship between individuals and things that they need, want, or own? That error refuses to acknowledge that voluntary exchange makes both parties wealthier, or that wealth is created by human activity. Any analysis based on it is fundamentally flawed, and must not be trusted.
I think a lot about this. The "heartlessness" of libertarians is hwhat kept me away from libertarianism for so long. Even today, I refuse to call myself a "libertarian." Just "libertarian~ish". If you feel guilty about not giving away everything you don't need, you're gonna drive yourself nuts! Even my leftist friends treat themselves to Shawarma from time to time!
Here are the principles that I try to live by:
1. First, you are primarily responsible for yourself. You must make sure you are not starving and will not starve if you lose your job or become too disabled to work. hWhich happens to a lot of people over the age of 70. So, don't discount that possibility too much.
2. Then, your kids. You must ensure that they're safe, warm and not hungry: above the 15th weight percentile for their age.
3. Your wife can help herself. It's nice to treat her. But usually, you don't NEED to. Unless she's like 8 months pregnant working a physically demanding noxious fumes factory...
4. You have no obligation to your adult children, unless they can't help themselves. Like they're disabled or something.
5. You have no obligation to your parents unless they are doing everything to help themselves and they are absolutely poor. i.e. They are disabled, can't work, already sold the house and are now freezing to death cause they can't pay the gas bill in their apartment.
6. You have no obligation to help those who are hurting themselves, like to save a suicidal person, a drug addict or an obese person. Even if these people end up gying. You have only so many fucks to give.
7. You have no obligation to help those who are not helping themselves. i.e. Those who _could_ provide for themselves but instead go on welfare, etc.
8. Points 6 and 7 only apply to people's current situation. If someone was a drug addict for 20 years, cleans up and gets a job hwhen they're 50, works till they have a stroke at 70 and now can't work and they're freezing to death, you MAY have an obligation to help. Tough love for PRESENT and FUTURE mistakes is reasonable. Tough love for PAST mistakes is a harder pill to swallow. But I think you are just more heartless than me, sir. 😛
9. You DO have an obligation to help those who tried their best, but through no fault of their own are suffering from absolute poverty. For example, the disabled or starving children in third-world countries.
10. However, your obligation is NOT "joint and several", it's just "several" (proportionate). For example, if there's a Billion people starving to death in the world and a Billion people in the world who are able to help them, you are not obliged to feed the hwhole Billion. Just one. I think this is one of the main reasons people reject the principle of a moral obligation to help those in need, because they feel: IF there is such a moral obligation, I should not permit myself ANY luxury, so long as there is anyone starving in the world. And they realize (correctly) that: Such a life would make them absolutely miserable! So, they go the way and say: Fuck it! I have NO obligation to help anyone else. I think my compromise is a LOT more reasonable.
11. Your obligation to help those in need does not stop at your borders. If there are starving people overseas, you should help them, too. In fact, you should probably start with them. Because helping people in absolute poverty in poor countries is a lot cheaper than helping struggling Americans, due to various factors like cheaper cost of living, warmer climates, and simpler needs. Americans who try their best but can't make ends meet, in America, probably have more "complex" needs that would be more expensive to fix.
12. Notwithstanding point 11, point 10 is a bit of an oversimplification. You should do enough to help the AVERAGE person in need. Let's say there's a Billion people in need, some with simple needs that would be cheap to fix, some with more complex needs. But the total cost is $1 Trillion USD. Then, the average cost is $1000 each. Even if you can feed a Kenyan for $365, you're not done! You should still give $1000, but it's good to focus that money on where you can get the most "bang for your buck" first. Once we feed all the starving children in Africa, THEN we can worry about the homeless Americans.
13. Notwithstanding point 11, if it's your money, you get to pick and choose who you wanna help. For example, you might prefer to help your American cousin with HIV/AIDS than a starving African child. That's cool. Even if you use up your charity budget on your cousin and can't afford to help any starving African children.
14. Notwithstanding point 13, I don't get the "My country FIRST!" mentality. Like, given the choice of helping a fellow Canadian stranger or a Kenyan stranger, I am indifferent. Given the choice of helping TWO Kenyan strangers or one Canadian stranger, I would choose to help the two Kenyans in a heartbeat. I honestly think people who would choose to save one Canadian over two Kenyans to be slightly racist. They still fulfill their moral obligation of helping those in dire poverty (_somebody_ has gotta help the poor Canadians) but they are still kinda racist. In fact, I would go as far as choosing to save two Kenyan strangers over my own cousin! But maybe I am weird. Or maybe everyone else is weird and I'm the only sane one left! Still haven't figured out hwhich...