CDZ I think how well a country is governed can be measured by the prosperity of the citizens

[grbb]

To be more precise.....

I think the primary value of a country can be measured by the financial return to its current citizens/rulers/owners and their biological descendants. And that can be very measurable. Citizenship can have a valuation or pay a dividend and we can see it going up or down.

This is important. A country can stop producing kids and inherit all the wealth to fewer kids. Percapita income is up. But that's not good.

Immigrants can thoroughly replace the country. I wouldn't call this a success either.

A country can acquire another region or another state or merge. This is not necessarily a good thing. Will jews want to accept Palestinians as fellow citizens? Not a good idea.

A king can oppress the people and make more money. Well... Like Saddam? How rich is he now?

The people that let themselves be governed by stupid dictators will lose money. They will wisely come up with a way to prevent that.

A country can sell all governments assets and give bigger dividends to all its citizens. However, the valuation of the government itself will drop.

A government can tax too much or too little. Both will decrease valuation.

What?

What about other values?

What about liberty? If you don't value freedom, you lose both money and liberty. If you don't appreciate security, you lost both money and security.

That means liberty is more important than money. Right? Wrong.

And that's precisely the point.

Because you will lose money when you don't value liberty and security, a country wanting to get rich will appreciate freedom and security automatically.

It will be like interviewing McDonald CEO.

Why do you care only about money o McDonald CEO? You should also think about producing delicious burgers.

The CEO will explain that it's because he cares about the money he will also make a delicious burger.

A CEO that is too obsessed with making delicious burgers will over-allocate resources spent on burger research. Those CEOs will make less money for their corporations.

When that happens, fewer customers can enjoy their burgers.

A CEO that is obsessed adequately with making money will also make a delicious burger. CEOs that are obsessed with making delicious burgers will not necessarily make money and will lose both the burgers and the money.

The same way, if we are concerned too much about liberty, to the point of legalizing unvaccinated kids, we will get sick. Then we will lose security and freedom.

If we're concerned too much about security to the point that we don't trade with foreigners, like the ancient Ming dynasty, we will lost both money, and can't pay troops, and got swallowed by the Qing.

If McDonald's burger is not delicious, customers won't come. Hence, it's toward McDonald's best interest to make the delightful burger.

Making delicious burger can be a mean to an end of making money. It can be an end by itself. If it's just a means to an end, we can see if it's okay by seeing how much money it makes.

If it's an end by itself, we can judge whether it's a good end or not by whether it's making money.

Either case, we can see whether McDonald's delicious burger is a good strategy or not, something difficult to measure because delicious is vague, to whether the burgers make money or not. That is easier to measure.

The same way, saying immigrants are good or not, whether legalization of drugs is good or not, whether regulation is reasonable or not, is hard to measure.

However, good immigration policy will make a country prosper. Sensible legalization of drugs will attract productive taxpayers. Sensible regulation that promotes fairness and honesty in business will improve economy and income.

Corporations share price and dividend reflects how well shareholders manage the corporations. Citizenship valuation reflects how well citizens manage their country.

If I look at Syria, Afganistan, Iraq, and Venezuela, I can conclude that their citizens are not wise.

I think it's much easier to sell capitalism with this agenda than saying it's right or wrong.

 

[Billy_Kinetta]

America's poor are considered wealthy compared to the rest of the world's poor.

 

[william the wie]

Without Uncle Sugar a lot of the rest of the world will go down tubes.

 

[grbb]

America's poor are considered wealthy compared to the rest of the world's poor.

Precisely.

If US citizenship is up for sale, the valuation will be higher than the assessment of say, Venezuela citizenship.

I have a solution to Venezuelan. It looks like democracy isn't working out well on your country because voters there are stupid. Benevolent dictators are better than democracy with stupid voters.

Why don't we buy their citizenship?

Prosperous provinces and countries should just buy citizenship and ownership of poor countries. Citizenship must be acquired and sold at market price.

If 10% of voters are wise investors, I bet all countries will be governed well.

 

[grbb]

Nowadays, people are free to move from state to state. However, moving to another state/province just because your fellow citizen vote for a stupid governor is hard right?

I have a more natural way.

Let each state charge a small amount of money for all non-resident — things like $1k per year.

Now. Say your citizen pick a governor you don't agree.

Then people will not feel comfortable living in those states. They will move to another country.

Before that happen, you short the stocks of your state. You buy the share of another state that picks a better governor.

After a while, the stock of your state drop and the stock of another state go up. You sell stock on other state and buy stock of your state.

Now you have 2 shares of your state. You can vote twice. That bad governor won't win election next round.

Hurray.... To ensure that the states remain "democracy", we can arrange that everyone can have 10 shares. However, the shares can have varying valuations.

 

[denmark]

To be more precise.....

I think the primary value of a country can be measured by the financial return to its current citizens/rulers/owners and their biological descendants. And that can be very measurable. Citizenship can have a valuation or pay a dividend and we can see it going up or down.

This is important. A country can stop producing kids and inherit all the wealth to fewer kids. Percapita income is up. But that's not good.

Immigrants can thoroughly replace the country. I wouldn't call this a success either.

A country can acquire another region or another state or merge. This is not necessarily a good thing. Will jews want to accept Palestinians as fellow citizens? Not a good idea.

A king can oppress the people and make more money. Well... Like Saddam? How rich is he now?

The people that let themselves be governed by stupid dictators will lose money. They will wisely come up with a way to prevent that.

A country can sell all governments assets and give bigger dividends to all its citizens. However, the valuation of the government itself will drop.

A government can tax too much or too little. Both will decrease valuation.

What?

What about other values?

What about liberty? If you don't value freedom, you lose both money and liberty. If you don't appreciate security, you lost both money and security.

That means liberty is more important than money. Right? Wrong.

And that's precisely the point.

Because you will lose money when you don't value liberty and security, a country wanting to get rich will appreciate freedom and security automatically.

It will be like interviewing McDonald CEO.

Why do you care only about money o McDonald CEO? You should also think about producing delicious burgers.

The CEO will explain that it's because he cares about the money he will also make a delicious burger.

A CEO that is too obsessed with making delicious burgers will over-allocate resources spent on burger research. Those CEOs will make less money for their corporations.

When that happens, fewer customers can enjoy their burgers.

A CEO that is obsessed adequately with making money will also make a delicious burger. CEOs that are obsessed with making delicious burgers will not necessarily make money and will lose both the burgers and the money.

The same way, if we are concerned too much about liberty, to the point of legalizing unvaccinated kids, we will get sick. Then we will lose security and freedom.

If we're concerned too much about security to the point that we don't trade with foreigners, like the ancient Ming dynasty, we will lost both money, and can't pay troops, and got swallowed by the Qing.

If McDonald's burger is not delicious, customers won't come. Hence, it's toward McDonald's best interest to make the delightful burger.

Making delicious burger can be a mean to an end of making money. It can be an end by itself. If it's just a means to an end, we can see if it's okay by seeing how much money it makes.

If it's an end by itself, we can judge whether it's a good end or not by whether it's making money.

Either case, we can see whether McDonald's delicious burger is a good strategy or not, something difficult to measure because delicious is vague, to whether the burgers make money or not. That is easier to measure.

The same way, saying immigrants are good or not, whether legalization of drugs is good or not, whether regulation is reasonable or not, is hard to measure.

However, good immigration policy will make a country prosper. Sensible legalization of drugs will attract productive taxpayers. Sensible regulation that promotes fairness and honesty in business will improve economy and income.

Corporations share price and dividend reflects how well shareholders manage the corporations. Citizenship valuation reflects how well citizens manage their country.

If I look at Syria, Afganistan, Iraq, and Venezuela, I can conclude that their citizens are not wise.

I think it's much easier to sell capitalism with this agenda than saying it's right or wrong.

Can you summarize your OP? It made my eyes glaze.
Are you saying that MONEY is the primary indicator of happiness in society?
If so, money for ALL, or for some?

 

[grbb]

What I am trying to say is money is an excellent measure.

There are other important values. However, those values show up in money.

I also value security, clean environment, justice, and freedom.

Because I value such things, I would rather pay bigger tax to live in such countries than in countries with a high crime rate, dirty environment, unfair, and unfree.

Hence, valuation for countries that value security, cleanliness, justice, and freedom will go up. And that's measurable.

There is a debate within the libertarian circle (another forum), whether businesses should be regulated or not.

Some say no. Some say only against force or fraud. Some say more regulation is needed against unfair and misleading advertising.

Obviously the last way is pretty common sense but hard to define. What is "fair"?

Well. I don't know. It's hard to say. But regulations that are "fair" will also improve a country's valuation.

Tell starving incel welfare recipient how awesome freedom is, and he'll still vote democrat. Tell him that if we have freedom, you get more dividend and see what he thinks.

 

[denmark]

What I am trying to say is money is an excellent measure.

There are other important values. However, those values show up in money.

I also value security, clean environment, justice, and freedom.

Because I value such things, I would rather pay bigger tax to live in such countries than in countries with a high crime rate, dirty environment, unfair, and unfree.

Hence, valuation for countries that value security, cleanliness, justice, and freedom will go up. And that's measurable.

There is a debate within the libertarian circle (another forum), whether businesses should be regulated or not.

Some say no. Some say only against force or fraud. Some say more regulation is needed against unfair and misleading advertising.

Obviously the last way is pretty common sense but hard to define. What is "fair"?

Well. I don't know. It's hard to say. But regulations that are "fair" will also improve a country's valuation.

Tell starving incel welfare recipient how awesome freedom is, and he'll still vote democrat. Tell him that if we have freedom, you get more dividend and see what he thinks.

You agree that valuation of society includes security, and that fairness among all citizens would increase security (less crime)?
Therefore, a country where 1% of population owns 99% of wealth/assets is not a “valuable” place to live?

 

[task0778]

Does how well a country is governed depend on outcomes? Suppose country A is rich in natural resources much moreso than country B, whose prosperity and standard of living is less than that of country A. What if country A is rife with corruption and waste, while country B is more efficient and effective but still not as prosperous as A? What if income inequality is worse in country A, are they better governed? What if their standing before their laws and economic opportunities in country A is less than that in country B, are they better governed just because they have tons of oil or something?

Tain't all that cut and dried. What if one country spends a lot more money than they receive, creating more debt that is passed on to future generations, so that the current population is more prosperous? Is the size of the private sector relative to the public a factor? How well is a country governed if the governed have less control over their own destiny? What if your basic human rights are more restrained, even though prosperity is more evenly distributed, what then? What if your rights are non-existent, isn't that basically what government is for? Maybe we're having the wrong discussion, exactly what is the function of gov't? If you don't know that, then any measurement is fruitless, is it not?

 

[Toronado3800]

What I am trying to say is money is an excellent measure.

There are other important values. However, those values show up in money.

I also value security, clean environment, justice, and freedom.

Because I value such things, I would rather pay bigger tax to live in such countries than in countries with a high crime rate, dirty environment, unfair, and unfree.

Hence, valuation for countries that value security, cleanliness, justice, and freedom will go up. And that's measurable.

There is a debate within the libertarian circle (another forum), whether businesses should be regulated or not.

Some say no. Some say only against force or fraud. Some say more regulation is needed against unfair and misleading advertising.

Obviously the last way is pretty common sense but hard to define. What is "fair"?

Well. I don't know. It's hard to say. But regulations that are "fair" will also improve a country's valuation.

Tell starving incel welfare recipient how awesome freedom is, and he'll still vote democrat. Tell him that if we have freedom, you get more dividend and see what he thinks.

To some extent that is true.

It gets complicated when you try to decide if subtracting debt frm GDP is needed.

Then there is the blessing of geographic isolation. France, Poland, the USSR, got screwed by being placed near Germany and China near Japan. The Eastern Roman Empire as the buffer to Islam.

 

[grbb]

You agree that valuation of society includes security, and that fairness among all citizens would increase security (less crime)?
Therefore, a country where 1% of population owns 99% of wealth/assets is not a “valuable” place to live?

In most cases, it's automatically taken into account.

For example, say I am an online marketplace. Part of my job is to hire customer service to resolve customers' dispute.

If I resolve dispute unfairly, people will go to another online marketplace.

The same way, a country that fails to recognize which individuals are productive and beneficial will go poor. A country that can correctly reward productive individuals will be rich.


If someone can get very rich without contributing anything to the economy or the state, then the person is not productive. It is toward the best interest of the country to get rid such persons.

However if a person can get very rich by contributing positively to the economy, it is toward the best interest of voters/owners in those state to have productive individuals and company to live in your state.

I would say, a country maximizing its profit will tend to be capitalistic. Capitalism is doing a good job properly aligning people's interests in productivity. Also, capitalism works "almost naturally."

Capitalistic countries will have less "costs" to run than countries with big government.

However, capitalism doesn't answer all the questions. This will go further than capitalism.

Should we allow people to be free to do things that hurt other people?

For example, what about dumping poisons to rivers?

Or what about misleading marketing?

Or what about selling a dangerous or defective product?

What about force or fraud?

What about breeding while poor. Say someone produces 40 children and live on welfare?

What to do with those? Is that humans' right?

Here a country maximizing its profit will have guidance to what extent things should be allowed, fined, or punish.

Of course, a country can deport or disallow anyone they don't like. That too will reduce damage.

 

[grbb]

Let me give you a difference between democracy and a privatized state. In both country the citizen can vote. In democracy, the citizen votes. In a privatized state, the citizens own a share each and each share vote.

Say someone uses LSD and jump on cliff.

In democracy, most voters do not know about LSD. There is hysteria. Ban all drugs. Pharmacies with financial interests lobby politicians to criminalize LSD.

In privatized state, someone uses LSD and jump on cliff. Well, the CEO of the state realize that LSD is actually quite save. Also he realizes that many LSD users are productive tax payers. He chose to tax LSD instead.

Many LSD users prefer to pay those taxes then being put in jail in another country. So they move to the state that legalize LSD.

The people? The people does not need to know whether LSD is good or not.

All the people need to know is that their citizen dividend or valuation went up.

Those who disagree can always sell their share to another citizen and another country.

 

[grbb]

Any questions? Can you think of any value that is not captured by share valuation of a state? Someone dump pollution, that lower state valuation. Crime rate goes up, that lower state valuation. People smoke weed in state that doesn't allow weed, state valuation drop. Legalizing weed also improve state valuation. So each state can be a "niche".

We privatize cinema, bakery, church, mosques, internet, computers, and pretty much anything.

Our nations are effectively capitalistic firms. Nations do not attack each other and they trade with each other.

Most regulations are replaced by private companies like Uber.

So why aren't state/province/local governments be privatized too?

 

[grbb]

Here, knowing the valuation of your state will definitely solve this problem

This is not something democracy really solve. Just combine capitalism with democracy and get the best of both world.

 

[Anathema]

I believe the measure of the value of a nation is the MOALITY of its citizens; a measure by which the United Ststes of America is an abject failure.

 

[sartre play]

Why are suicides up in white men? why is drug use & deaths growing? why are there more and more people living on the streets? why are people more stressed & angry? why is the working class having a harder time getting ahead in life? are things getting better for most Americans ? something is very wrong in how we are governed, as things continue to get worse not better.

 

[initforme]

I see us slowly heading towards a plutocracy. The big corporations want more and more and want workers to have less and less.

 

[initforme]

Humans in general are immoral. We are sinners. Also, all the stresses our society has leads people to try and escape...down the wrong path. We sure love our booze and pills, etc. Many can't handle it. It gets out of control. Crazy times. I admit I like a cold Heineken....in the confines of my home.

 

[grbb]

Why are suicides up in white men? why is drug use & deaths growing? why are there more and more people living on the streets? why are people more stressed & angry? why is the working class having a harder time getting ahead in life? are things getting better for most Americans ? something is very wrong in how we are governed, as things continue to get worse not better.

Yes. The problem your system encourages that to happen.

And you don't have a choice.

Say you are poor. You have two choices. You breed kids, or you save money. If you the latter you are taxed to support the former. So they want you to suffer.

Why don't you have choices? Because of democracy.

In a democracy, you pick two twin candidates in each election. You can go to a different state, but a different state will have similar demographic and their median voters tend to want the same thing.

So what's the solution?

Combine democracy with capitalism. Allow people to buy and sell shares of their cities. Then let taxpayers go to state they want.

You can always judge that your state is doing well by looking at the valuation of your share.

To ensure stability, ensure that every adult people have the exact number of share (say 1). That way we don't have too much wealth disparity causing imbalance. Those who create imbalance will have to go somewhere else reducing his power.

 

[sartre play]

Poor Americans like every other country's poor do not compare them self buy how rich or poor other country's are. they compare them self by others living in there own country..