Quote from: TheKid on March 02, 2011, 10:15:33 PM

I want to sell my services doing X for a certain amount of money (or more!) Y. If I can get Y for X, then it is not a coercive deal as I WANT THIS TO HAPPEN, and, presumably the other party does as well.

The mathematics on this is pretty simple to measure from a perspective of game theory. If you have information and power symmetries all exchanges will tend toward mutual benefit. As information or power asymmetries are introduced, the exchanger who is "upstream" of the asymmetry will tend to end up as the "more equal" partner, all other things being equal.

Information and power asymmetries are easy to measure and not even the most naive economist would pretend modern market scenarios are free of them, except as a simplifying assumption to perform large-scale simulation. If you're familiar with game theory sitting down and modeling your "best guess" on many real-world situations might surprise you.

Given that we live in a real world where information and power asymmetries do exist, the natural conclusion is that without an intentional decision on the part of the "more equal" person many exchanges will not be mutually beneficial. This can be hard to fit into human psychology, which is fair, and to be expected. Many people don't seem to realise that a lot of "good people" on the upside of slavery, absent a careful re-examination, would have by default thought that things were as they should be. Basic human psychology. Food for thought.

Pretty much the only remaining route if the above paragraph is uncomfortable is to convert the asymmetries themselves into a "right" to profit by virtue of being smarter/stronger/etc. I have a pretty massive IQ, and I find that difficult to stomach since I am very well aware that did not choose to be who or where I am, and my life has been pretty damn easy.

At the end of the day, no outside force is going to make the "more equal" behave one way or another. But if they want to face their own consciences there's really no avoiding that they have to be the ones working to keep exchanges mutually beneficial.

Quote from: TheKid on March 02, 2011, 10:15:33 PM

FatherMcGruder, your arguments make no sense.

I'd give him a little more credit than that. If the answers to these questions were as obvious as many people seem to think, there would be a lot more unanimity on these issues.

Quote from: ryepdx on March 03, 2011, 01:21:11 AM

Um... actually, poverty is a choice.

Categorical assertions like this seem pretty ridiculous given the extensive data available to us. For example, in my comparatively wealthy country children are disproportionately poor compared to the general population, and minority children even more so. If everyone "chose" to be poor such segments would be affected with equal probability, or possibly even less considering the fact that most societies invest heavily in their children. Clearly other factors are at play.

sincerely,
eMansipater