The points raised by Charles J. Reid on Wed, 14 Jan are valid and must be
answered. Or at least I think so. Also, Paul Augustine on Tue, 20 Jan
brings in a different issue but one that connects, here again this is how
I see it.
To begin some comment on the points.
1. >Any comments on this exchange about the "need to know" issue and
compartmentalization of information?
Everyone 'needs to know' the facts necessary in order to perform the
designated task. The street sweeper needs to know where his round is. The
shop assistant 'needs to know' how to hold an item so that the bar code
can be read. Going up the ladder everyone needs to know what they are
doing, and some need to know what others below the ladder are doing.
However, it isn't such a good idea to 'know' how things work above your
station, for many reasons that I'm sure everyone knows. There is also a
culture based on only knowing enough or keeping to the things that you
know.
Some business's make profits because they 'know' or have specialised
skills. Many other 'business's make profits because they 'know' by
selective manipulation of knowledge, that is, everyone could perform
equally well if they were aware of the secret. Very often the 'secret' is
precise data about the economy.
2. >What do we have a right to know about each other?
Whatever is interactive regarding a community. The greater majority of us
are deliberately focused on the things other people do that really are no
concern of the greater population. For everyone who takes a great
interest in the side issues of politicians for example, the same number
have no interest in what their policies are. Is this deliberate?
3. >We also have a meta-question: by what rule or authority shall we
apply to answer this question?
The reason why we don't 'know' is because we gave up the option long ago.
To take back the right to know will not be easy. If I understand what
Paul Augustine says I'd say he wants to know - not out of curiosity but
to improve the general well-being of the immediate community.
4. >But there is an upside to this. There seems to be a natural law the
>operates practically: most people don't have the time to devote to
>accumulating information about everyone else, hence don't even care.The point here is that most people don't know what information there is
out there and if they had it what good would it do? It is relatively easy
to give some idea of what data might be worthwhile - what isn't so easy
is showing everyone what it means to have the data.
Accumulating the data is helped largely by having an internet, and having
computers nowadays that can handle huge quantities of data does mean that
no time at all is needed to gather, process and distribute. The time for
the individual is with input, but even here I think there is a way around
the difficulty. What I am certain of is that no government will provide
the data, I shall explain all of this in some detail in a moment. There
is no point in making any comment unless there is something that can be
added to further the idea you have. To do what I suggest is going to take
a community of individuals who can see the benefits of the system.
Remember that the there is nothing new or inventive here, it is all
happening right now, the 'capitalist' has all of this, the 'capitalist'
knows everything about everyone. Another thing to keep in mind is that
the system of 'having the knowledge' is an evolving process, anyway, this
is what I seem to think might be a start.
So what is this knowledge? It is knowing the quantitative data of how
people exchange goods and services. This is really what I think sums up
the notion of what we perceive to be 'capitalism'. Behind this curtain
there are those who know how it works, and have up to the minute data on
how it is happening now. Having this knowledge before the majority is
worth a fortune, and this is where fortune's are made. Notice that there
isn't the definite literature here, the whole basis is keeping
information 'secret' or having it for such a time whereby the fortune is
made. Once made then some of the information can be given. If you are
seen to be a 'winner', or have lots of money, people will sit for hours
and listen to any rubbish you care to tell them, rarely will anyone give
a true account of how a fortune is made.
At the other end of the spectrum we have what is perceived to be
'socialism'. Here this is very much like having a plan of campaign for a
battle that is read in advance by the enemy. To me this is why there are
so many failures of socialism. First, the notion of an 'enemy' isn't part
of their thoughts, second, the mechanism of application tends to be
radical, there is risk with a relatively high degree of failure, third,
the data existing is somehow 'unavailable' is 'unnecessary' or
irrelevant. Contrary to that the 'capitalist' lets the exchange of goods
and services evolve, and having the 'knowledge' knows exactly where there
is a fortune to be made. See Richard K, Moore, Tue, 23 Dec 1997. Of
course they know! I bet those who are making the fortunes have a good
laugh when they read through the analysis, if they indeed bother.
So what information am I as an individual prepared to give to the
community? Well, not a lot more than what I give already. I'd say what
comes right at the top of the list is bank transactions. This gives a
very accurate profile of how I exchange goods and services. If this is
known to members of the community then as a single item of data does not
do them any real good, it might satisfy their curiosity but it will have
no effect on the systematic process. Collectively the data is fundamental
to the process of 'capitalism'.
If I live in a democracy, and here this is the Aristotlean
concept - where everyone is able to become involved in everything, then I
think as a right the community needs to know that I am part of it. For
example, this is the information that needs to be known collectively.
Age.
Marital status.
Work status.
Number of children not earning.
Wages per unit time, week or month.
Total deductions, income tax, local tax, state insurance,
pensions.
Balance in Bank or other depository and individual transactions.
Investments, shares, bonds, etc.
Return on Investments.
This information should be known to everyone, but not as an
individual record. What I get in return is a summary of this, statistical
measures and totals. All of this information is known anyway and is
reviewed daily. Some of this is made available by way of government
statistics, although modified, and often several months after collation.
How is this to be done practically? There are undoubtedly
sufficient data links in existence now, but the chances of these being
made available for the purpose of giving everyone instant access is low
to not at all. However, with modern communications, I do not see a great
difficulty in posting up a few numbers, to a server, that acts like a
local accumulator, and posts on a stream of data. At this first stage of
collation the identity of each person is lost, the local server does not
need name and number of the individual to pass on to the higher level
server. A local server might cater for any number of people that can be
suitably handled, where the group is geographical. The numbers might be
anything from about two hundred to two hundred thousand persons. This
local server would publish the collated data, or make it available to
everyone, and at the same time post on to a state municipality, or
region, where again the compound data is available to everyone. The
ultimate for any individual might be the country, such as the USA or the
EU.
A lot of work for the individual? Democracy is precious and
doesn't come without commitment or cost. I tend to think that ignoring
the free availability of the data is leading to a reduction in democracy.
This is the price of belonging to a community, and here I'd say the
biggest drawback right now is commitment. And possibly a fear that
someone is going to be caught out. However, if this is done by consensus,
and not as a law then no prisoners are going to be taken.
So all of this needs to be proved. There are a number of hurdles,
the technical aspect, the software, and the availability of everyone to
partake in what will be an experiment in the first instance. No doubt
many people will shudder at the thought of this data becoming public,
well this is democracy. If a person wants absolute privacy, or doesn't
think they are part of the community then I dare say they will go to
their private island, or say they are part of another community, such as
the private island. I think too that if I had an income of three or four
thousand a week, with a few million in shares, bonds, etc., then I might
have doubts about the idea, and make damn sure everyone knew what they
were. This is often the way of democratising information, those who have
an interest in hiding their personal data are the first to offer every
reason on this earth why the idea will never work. This can be seen every
day, the slow process of finding the truth is like pulling teeth. For
those at the other end of the spectrum they have to provide accurate data
in any event, by government decree, so becoming actively part of the
democracy is not really a problem, and is much better than continually
saying 'that's the way of it', 'you can't change anything', etc., etc.
The greatest danger I can see is not the introduction and evolvement of
the system, it is being 'privatised' or controlled by government, so that
a few people have prior sighting in which to make 'alterations' or
decisions based on an agenda that isn't known to those making up the
community.
>From the collated data the variables such as Q, the total amount of money
in the system will be known, along with N, the number of people who are
part of the system. a measure of the Velocity of money, V, can be made
for each individual.
The data stream for each individual is stacked as follows, and is made up
for a given time period.
1.Input, wage and deposits other than from shares or bonds.
2.Outputs, the total for the time period.
3.Cash balance.
When this is compared with the data from the previous time period an
estimate of V is possible. This would be given as a quantity of money.
The outgoing data, one collated, comes streaming back to the
individual, and is loaded onto their 'econobrowser', or some programme
that presents the data as tabulations, graphs, and comparisons with
previous data. An important feature and one making the presentation mean
something is ranking of data to show 'most' and 'least', and to compare
changes over a period of time.
Any single person will be able to see where they are in the distribution
of wealth.
No data is collected and therefore none is seen with regard to
people's possessions, the value of their premise, type of vehicle, or
what kind of soap they use. What any individual has is possessions that
either increase in value or decay; it is no one's business to know what
the individual chooses to do with money.
Having data on wages and wealth it is possible to calculate the
index of concentration of both. If the index is C then if all people have
the same wage C=0.0 and if just one person gets all the money in a
community then C=1.0.
Each person or groups are n, where
n1 + n2 +n3 + …………nk = N
The average, or arithmetic mean is Q/N =Av. In order to get a value of
1.0 then when one person has all the money the excess over the average is
Q - Av
Therefore if this is divided by Q - Av, Q - Av/Q -Av = 1.0.
Two examples of the calculation are given below. The data is ranked so
that the shape of the distribution can be seen. The difference, or what
will either take the distribution to equality, is the difference between
the number of units of money and the average.
(I hope these tables come out as they I see them)
n u Av - n total
Individuals units of money difference difference
a 0 -7.82
b 1 -6.82
c 6 -1.82 17.28
d 7 -0.82
e 8 0.18
f 8 0.18
g 9 1.18
h 10 2.18 17.26
i 11 3.18
j 12 4.18
k 14 6.18
Total 86
Average 7.82
17.27
C = 17.27/86 - 7.82 = 0.22
n u Av - n total
Individuals units of money difference difference
a 0 -19.13
b 0 -19.13
c 3 -16.13 103.04
d 7 -12.13
e 8 -11.13
f 9 -10.13
g 11 -8.13
h 12 -7.13
i 20 0.87
j 26 6.87
k 28 8.87
l 30 10.87 103.09
m 31 11.87
n 40 20.87
o 62 42.87
Total 287
Average 19.13 103.065
C = 103.065/287 - 19.13 = 0.3847
Similar calculations can be made for wealth, that is share holding, bonds
and bank total.
Whilst this information deals only with money, it has to be remembered
that money is the measure of how goods and services are exchanged. This
data is largely used by the various agencies that determine economic
policy, and this policy is explained to the community without reference
to the economic data, in short, the community does not have the
benchmarks necessary to review decisions or make any sensible comment.
Also, a proposal can be tested or simulated, to see what the effect is
going to be for the community. When a community has the ability to do
this, and figure out what the benefits/disadvantages are I'd say issues
can be voted on, many of which at the present time do not appear to be
'political', or are allegedly beyond the capacity of the community to
understand. It is easy to see that when this happens the power of the
state is undermined, it then is on a downhill run of 'withering' away,
yet the process by which this is done is entirely by capitalist rules.
So, have a think about this, there is considerably more in the detail but
I think this is just at the stage of discussion and argument. There are
several possible outcomes when a community has this data, I have imagined
one or two, perhaps you should think about this. Whatever, I'd be
interested in what you have to think about this data collection.
William Kirk.