Re: IHT therapy

[djf500@york.ac.uk]

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I find the idea that anyone can be born with *any* money difficult to 
understand, never mind the idea that some babies are 'being born with more 
money' than others - it's not 'abhorrent', just an idea that i find 
difficult to understand. We are born dependant on our parents, and then we 
stike out ourselves, seperate from our parents.

The difference (questioned by Rab) between money and, say, beauty, is that 
you are born with beauty, but not with money.

It is a social convention, rather than a necessary fact, that we get money 
through both luck (i.e. inheritence) and judgement (i.e. through work). It 
seems reasonable that we should prefer that money us gained through 
judgement, rather than luck. IHT is a way of enforcing this preference, 
because inheritence is an example of where luck can bring you money - i 
reiterate: this luck is social luck, and IHT is a social means to adjust 
it.

This preference for a meritocracy over a lottery does not wipe out the 
winners/loser divide, it's just that the winners have won on the same terms 
as the losers. Perhaps under this system, different people would be winners 
and losers.

The main objection, i think, is that it would be a weird and twisted 
meritocracy if we started taking people's winnings away and giving it to 
the losers. And it would. But it should be contested that a child does not 
own his parents assets. If a parent dies, and the state takes all of their 
assets, then it does not take away anything from the child, but makes sure 
that money left floating (because the owner is no more) is ploughed back 
into the preferred meritocratic system.

Daniel


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