The DRO Model

Re: Supply-side issues and the DRO

WorBlux — Thu, 29 Sep 2011 23:46:03 GMT

First option, volunteer departments. A sponser DRO provides training and equipment to deal with the few cases tha tmight comes up.

Second a vigilience comitee, funding of the first option with donations or some other community oriented or cooperative solution

Third do what rural police departmenst already redomend, buy a .38 special or short shotgun and practice with them so you can defend youself.

Fourth as for sanctions there is aslways the town gossip. In small towns everyone knows everybody elses business and likely more effective than any sort of direct DRO monitering.

Re: Supply-side issues and the DRO

peoplespublic — Thu, 29 Sep 2011 21:55:18 GMT

More like the musings of somebody who does intellectual work for a living and has seen through a pretty ignorant theory for how something like this would work absent the state.

A supply-side deficiency completely shatters the entire system you propose. We're supposed to "exclude" violent criminals from society--which only works in a monopoly setting (even more so than the state...)--in a system with major supply-side decficiencies. Why don't you theorize about charities, instead of stuff like this.

Re: Supply-side issues and the DRO

argus — Tue, 06 Sep 2011 14:55:14 GMT

We've discussed if, how and to what extent a DRO would work.

It seems to me if you began a society from ground zero ..a DRO will organicaly form.

We're social animals and while I won't go so far as to claim we have a "DRO instinct" we do possess an evolved sense of reciprocity and altruism (that is after the needs of our kin group are taken care of).

It seems like the basis for every statist argument against DRO spawns fromt the issue of trust. Perhaps this stems from an ingrained belief in Original Sin (i.e. people are just rotten, dirty sinners). In reality, communities of a certain size (say 150-200) tend to police themselves and form DROS--often in the form of consensus justice or the informal appointment of a mediator. As a community grows larger, and people don't know each other personally, trust erodes.

When the State insists we are all incapable of forming relationships of trust without the Hand of Government, we as a larger group seem to believe it. Why? In short, a State thrives on fear in order to grow. DROs thrive on implied, natural trust.

As always....these are the musings of a newb...

Re: Supply-side issues and the DRO

nickcoons — Tue, 30 Aug 2011 07:24:41 GMT

Intellectual property is also both non-rivalrous and non-excludable, but people have made money from intellectual property for centuries, even before IP laws:

http://freenation.org/a/f31l1.html

Re: Supply-side issues and the DRO

MrCapitalism — Fri, 08 Jul 2011 04:44:37 GMT

since those people can just come up to MA whenever they want

How would they do this?

Re: Supply-side issues and the DRO

peoplespublic — Thu, 07 Jul 2011 21:55:08 GMT

Livemike:

peoplespublic:

Even assuming that enforcement is totally through economic and social exclusion that does not imply that you need 100% DRO coverage to make paying compensation worthwhile.

You jumped from one thing to the other. Okay: exclusion is the punishment as Stef has said many times over. So, let's say the whole DRO thing doesnt take within the boundaries of what is now Rhode Island. You'll get violators from CT, MA, NY, and even NH & VT moving there to live free of consequences, and hence the system won't be trustworthy since those people can just come up to MA whenever they want and rape/pillage, and hence no one will want to buy it, and hence it will self-destruct. You have to look at the institutional structure, and see how it's going to hold up to real life given the incentives. Public Goods can't be efficiently made into market goods, given the nature of non-excludability and non-rivalry and hence DRO's are a self-defeating concept, which is a shame that no one here has yet taken up the challenge of brainstorming a more suitable institution or series of institutions.

Re: Supply-side issues and the DRO

Livemike — Sun, 01 May 2011 05:17:27 GMT

peoplespublic:

Given the supply-side issues involved with Health Insurance in America, it occurs to me that if justice is to be distributed via insurance companies, there is going to be a discrepancy based on wealth and geography. Markets also are not uniform, and so they will experiment with difference instruments for justice if it is in fact left up to the markets. The insurance-based model of the DRO assumes uniformity, as without even distributions of the DRO's, they fail for lack of ability to enforce their decisions. If the grocery store can sell the 3x convicted child murderer his groceries without fearing DRO sanctions, they will. The only way they will fear DRO sanctions is if everyone else in the market will base their dealings off of DRO ratings.

Further, even if the standard practice of the DRO were to be established, there is still the problem of supply. An example follows this short summary. Even if one assumes perfectly even income distribution (for argument's sake, of course) there is still the problem of distribution. Disparities in infrastructure, population, nonmarket forces, ect. will make for supply problems with DRO's, much like health insurance.

Example: a friend of mine in Tennessee can afford health insurance (outright, if necessary) as she makes a nice salary, but her part of the state (within 6 hours driving distance...) is without HMO clinics, as is common in more rural areas in America. Her insurance is wasted. If this was the case for DRO-based insurance, she would have no justice, either? With healthcare, she can go to the emergency room at the local hospital. With justice, her other options are limited in her rural town. Yet, they still have rape, theft, murder, abduction, domestic abuse, ect.

I am wondering what the issue is if a nonmarket, nonstate entity (or entities) could provide justice; after all, there are scores of nonmarket, voluntary institutions. It isn't anti-voluntaryist to say that the market doesn't have to provide ALL public goods.

Brainstorm?

Ok there are a number of issues here. Firstly there are supply issues with health insurance in America, almost exclusively caused by government intervention. HMOs for instance were created through government legislation and exist only because people are willing to coerce and be coerced.

See
http://mises.org/journals/qjae/pdf/qjae4_4_6.pdf
https://mises.org/journals/scholar/Padilla3.f starting p22 and the sources in Stef's video on healthcare.

That is why your friend doesn't want standard insurance, because government intervention has made it expensive and not particularly suited to their customers needs. It's Ok though they still make a profit.

Secondly you do not need a uniform distribution of DRO to enforce their decisions. Even assuming that enforcement is totally through economic and social exclusion that does not imply that you need 100% DRO coverage to make paying compensation worthwhile. Dealing with people who ignore the laws the market creates is risky and therefore expensive. Few people will do it without a large markup that will at least cover their costs. Most people who don't join a DRO would have cooperate in other ways to exclude wrongdoers. In the case of a murderer who didn't pay "weregild" or similar however they would probably just be outlawed. This is a death sentence as soon as anyone wants to make it one and few would risk it.

Thirdly while some DROs would find it difficult to work in low income or low population density areas others would specialise in them. DROs unlike say mining companies or automobile firms, don't have large fixed expenses and could operate on a small scale. Cooperative firms or other forms of organisation could exist. It would depend on market circumstances. The firms would be part of the "market" in that they would supply goods and services using resources, but they need in the sense of being profit-based or even charge money. They could be donation supported (almost inevitable for a firm that specialises in the indigent) or user-owned cooperatives.

Re: Supply-side issues and the DRO

Junioreality — Sat, 30 Apr 2011 07:04:32 GMT

Whether people are cruel, selfish, shady, or not, a social system needs stability through individuals sharing common environmental conditions. And these same common environmental conditions are what can make one identify and preference against those individuals who are cruel and so forth. So, whether a group of people owns a DRO, a court service, a medical service or they are just regular Joes, for voluntary associations and value exchanges to take place effectively, it will require common environmental conditions like the Non Aggression Principle, Restitution, Social Preferencing, Valid Contracts, Property, Communication Networks and Open Identification on all these conditions (including the identity of individuals taking part) to exist.

Re: Supply-side issues and the DRO

Andrew S. — Fri, 01 Apr 2011 18:02:54 GMT

Amen Bobs!

Re: Supply-side issues and the DRO

threebobs — Fri, 01 Apr 2011 17:59:31 GMT

I don't want to be flippant, but logic indicates that if people can't be trusted to solve social problems with voluntary association....then surely they can't be trusted to solve the problems with non-voluntary interaction.

Any rule you create about 'people in general' (being selfish, cruel, warring, etc), is a rule that applies to all people in general. These negative aspects of human nature can't be solved by a violent monopoly but will only be multiplied.

The elimination of moral accountability doesn't solve the problem of lack of moral accountability.

So we are left with the default position of 'no state' regardless of any declarations about human nature.

Re: Supply-side issues and the DRO

Andrew S. — Fri, 01 Apr 2011 15:48:49 GMT

Andrew S.:

It's not realistic to assume that "lots of businesses would be [off the grid]".

Being in business requires working with diverse suppliers, creditors, dealerships, agencies, customers---the list goes on and on. My parents own a small business and I know they would not want to risk hurting their business' own reputation and be forced off the grid. Also, if there was so much opportunity off the grid, then what would be the service offered by a DRO, exactly?

peoplespublic:

By "off the grid" i meant outside the reach of a DRO, not off the electric grid per se; what I am trying to illustrate is how the market is inefficient at providing public goods; while public goods can be marketed in a limited variety (mediation/arbitration), markets are still inefficient at distributing public goods, simply because markets make money off of excludeable, rivalrous goods.

The general idea is the DRO could only really thrive on a limited basis, so there needs to be some other nonmarket way of administering justice. Somalia, for example, uses tribal law. I am not sure how a modern post-industrial society would choose to do it.

First, please use the quote feature correctly to avoid confusion.

Also, I understand what you meant by 'off the grid'. Businesses need to interact with eachother in this stateless society and generally turn to DROs when they are working with another company that they have no history of interractions with or has been accused of being less trustworthy in the past.

Of course, businesses would continuously work with suppliers and customers both with and without DRO involvement (perhaps they would have a blanket contract for general transactions). For example, bringing some cardboard to the recycling yard may be done without a DRO.

However, no business in a free society would want to eliminate the possibility of working with a DRO when necessary. For instance, wiget supplier A may only deal with other businesses with a DRO contract, accepting higher overhead in exchange for lower risk.

Re: Supply-side issues and the DRO

shanghaifathers — Fri, 01 Apr 2011 08:20:00 GMT

People will do anything when there is personal gain to be had.

I could be barking up the wrong tree. but sometimes "throw-away" side comments actually reveal deeper premises that make lower-order discussions moot. I just like to clarify.

This particular side comment suggests that there may be deeper issues at work than the perception of logistical problems with the DRO model.

If this is a window into your fundamental view of human nature (which it may not be), you have already answered your own question on the only level that really counts.

That is: If enough people are crummy enough, often enough, then any system that requires higher standards in any of these categories can't work, by definition, no matter how you rearrange the pieces.

If so, it still doesn't mean you've come to the wrong place, though. Human nature is the subject of much discussion around these parts.

However, looking at human nature, as opposed to economics, might provide a more interesting and productive context for exploring how and why non-coercive social systems would or wouldn't work.

Just a thought. Feel free to ignore it.

As far as what's right or wrong with the DRO model, from an economic perspective, I don't know.

All questions are good questions, though, because someone's going to try it one day, and they'll need the biggest running start they can get.

Re: Supply-side issues and the DRO

MrCapitalism — Fri, 01 Apr 2011 05:07:36 GMT

peoplespublic:

Then there can't be any criminal sanctions.

Sure there are. If you belong to a DRO you are "protected" from criminals. If you aren't, then you aren't "protected." Protected in this sense = provided the service of knowing who criminals are, and having them forcefully exclueded from all private property.

So all a 3x child-molesting murderer would have to do is move to a nice small town in the South where people live without a DRO-system and he/she can live quite well and keep on murdering/molesting, as long as he's able to hold down a job he's fine.

This is exaclty the point. The current 'justice' system is based on the violation of the rights of the criminal. If you live under DRO protection, this criminal is excluded from your society.

What do you care what he does, so long as he is safely removed from you and those you care about?

If the people he lives near are also okay with his child molestation.. there really isn't much that we can do about that. (I would consider them criminals as well).

People who live in remote areas outside of the reach of a DRO must live with this choice, the same as they do with every other service (piped in water, cable TV, internet, cell phone, newspaper). Do the benefits outweigh the costs? That is for them to decide. If they really want DRO protection they must be prepared to pay the higher costs required to service their remote location.

Re: Supply-side issues and the DRO

peoplespublic — Fri, 01 Apr 2011 04:16:20 GMT

Andrew S.:

It's not realistic to assume that "lots of businesses would be [off the grid]".

Being in business requires working with diverse suppliers, creditors, dealerships, agencies, customers---the list goes on and on. My parents own a small business and I know they would not want to risk hurting their business' own reputation and be forced off the grid. Also, if there was so much opportunity off the grid, then what would be the service offered by a DRO, exactly?

By "off the grid" i meant outside the reach of a DRO, not off the electric grid per se; what I am trying to illustrate is how the market is inefficient at providing public goods; while public goods can be marketed in a limited variety (mediation/arbitration), markets are still inefficient at distributing public goods, simply because markets make money off of excludeable, rivalrous goods.

The general idea is the DRO could only really thrive on a limited basis, so there needs to be some other nonmarket way of administering justice. Somalia, for example, uses tribal law. I am not sure how a modern post-industrial society would choose to do it.