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I'm not interested in abolishing private property. I think there is some connection between property and responsibility. But I do see the point of having a mixed economy like ours, where there is both private and public investment.

I also see the point of having some mildly redistributive taxation. Perhaps the most obvious case is in disaster relief. When lives are at stake, we don't ask government to wait and see if private charity is going to be enough. We expect government to step in and help when disaster strikes. The question that remains is: can some situations be so catastrophically bad that they would qualify as disasters--the slow starvation of a group of people, the eviction and continued homelessness of some people? We are not talking about cradle to grave security here, or taking care of the lazy. We are talking about looking at a carefully defined set of circumstances that might be qualified as cases of saving lives. Giving help to those who are doing the best they can but falling behind. I think in a decent society, it should be a scandal if people are starving to death while others have plenty and to spare. But the USDA is suggesting their are people right now under chronic food stress in the US. I don't think we should turn a blind eye to this. I know there are good people who do care and have done quite a lot. The question is: is it enough?

I think there are arguments from self-interest for why we as a people would want government doing this in our name. Quite aside from the humanitarian impulse that cares for the suffering of others, there are other arguments from self-interest. The first would be the "I want to do the right thing, but sometimes fail to follow through' argument. Weakness of will, the bane of New Years resolutions, can defeat our desire to help. We tend to look at the short term, at the immediate pressing problems we have, and forget about our good intentions. So some people would appreciate the government giving them reminders (at tax time) about their unkept promises to help out.

The other arguments are the "you can pay me now or pay me later' type arguments. My reference is to the old Fram oil filter commercials. People sometimes fool themselves into thinking they are saving money by skipping oil changes and replacing their oil filters. But that doesn't solve the problem. It postpones it. Putting off the day of reckoning may mean we take a small manageable problem, that is easily and cheaply solved, and turn it into a large expensive problem that may not even be completely solvable. So here. If we say 'why should I pay for other people's kids to go to public school' we may find we have under-qualified workers showing up, people who can't hold a job. people who don't take good care of themselves (because they don't understand preventive health) and clog up our hospitals; people who decide to go into crime and require bigger expenditures on law enforcement, the courts, prisons. People who will look at your success and envy you, or rob from you, or even try to kill you.

Now, I can hear some of you ready to say: I can't be accountable for other people's actions. And that is true. But the social problems will still be yours. And you will still have to pay for them with your taxes. So the question here is: would you rather pay a little in prevention, or a lot in cure? My guess is that you could convince rational people that it makes good sense to pay some redistributive taxes for a limited range of concerns.

Now I am not talking about confiscating property here. Private property will still exist. And the taxes we pay will have to be the taxes we vote for. There is little danger that the voters are going to agree to tax themselves into poverty. But since we all benefit from being in society, it makes sense to ask people to pay into the system to keep it running. The government should do whatever we the people tell it to, but I think we could get reasonable people to agree to do some of these things I have mentioned. But that is the point of this thread for me: we would need to persuade people of this. Imposing it can be every bit as bad as some of you fear.

I also see the point of having some mildly redistributive taxation

I agree, only because we can't seem to stop it. Spending other people's money is the single uniting aspect of politicians. I see private charity as being more than capable of carrying the load if and when the government assistance is terminated. When the government steps in, private support goes somewhere else. I agree, the truely hungry, the truely damaged should have a place to go.

People who will look at your success and envy you, or rob from you, or even try to kill you.

This is an arguement that falls on deaf ears for me. I have of course heard it from some liberal thinkers before you. "We support afirmative action and welfare because if we don't, the people in the ghetto will rise up against us". Well, we should help them but welfare leads to dependency and afirmative action denies true merit and is in itself a form of discrimination which in reverse we would not tolerate. The help needs to be offered in the form of a lifetime of learning and not a day of relief.

There is little danger that the voters are going to agree to tax themselves into poverty. But since we all benefit from being in society, it makes sense to ask people to pay into the system to keep it running.

It is an interesting arguement. In the college dorm, the mere fact that some students did not intend to go to social functions allowed the majority to drop a redistributive tax called "social dues" and make each event a pay as you go. It destroyed the otherwise wonderful social life in the dorm. I believe as a liberal you would agree that you should not have to pay for services you might not use of a social nature, but would be quite willing that we should all pay for services of a charitable nature. I believe the tax limit is reached when people lose their incentive to earn more. Not all the way to poverty, just when they lose their personal incentive is too far. Let's continue to move in the direction of building incentives for people to move up in the quality of living that we all desire. Let them share more of the wealth earned by their hands, and let the education system properly serve both the learners but also the people who need adult training. I would much rather support education than prisons. But mind this, I would not tolerate extortion from the ghetto or the left wing, I would expect it to be met with the force of rational thought and the police force if necessary.