Topic: Why do people think income tax is ok? - page 10. (Read 17875 times)

I haven't voted myself in over a decade.  I think the democratic process becomes a problem when it trumps an individual's rights.  I share Larken Rose's sentiments about that process that he very eloquently explains in this video:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=_5mZ5FBHg0A

It is. Democracy is no guarantee against theft, murder or discrimination, but the dictatorship of a majority over a minority.

I can't argue with that - and I agree with you.

But like I said before - perhaps its the "democratic" process itself that is at fault here.

I'm not talking about direct participatory democracy here - I'm talking, for example, about a situation whereby a billionaire Australian US citizen can have a massive amount of political clout in the UK via a media empire propagating self serving propoganda.

Of course things are changing -  some of us don't today rely on information gatekeepers in order to form an informed opinion. Information, and the access to it, is being disseminated via the internet. Maybe democracy is more possible today than its ever been.

  But for me personally, because of the electoral system in the UK ( I can't comment on the US electoral system) I am in the position whereby my views are not being reflected or represented by any of the mainstream parties.

   And so I  am increasingly coming around to the view that my only option is to not to use my vote at all - because in voting I am being complicit in my own disenfranchisement.

Hah! I'm gonna make an educated guess here and correct me if I'm wrong, but unless you actually do live in qatar/somalia/moon then people are already taking your money so I don't have to. Isn't that what you're here to complain about?

I had thought you were exaggerating about the whole "shoot you and lock up your dog" thing, but maybe where you were going wrong was your cunning plan to evade taxes by dropping anyone who comes to collect them with a shotgun.

In case I didn't clarify, yes, if you earn more than a certain amount you should be compelled to pay for the wellbeing of others. If you don't pay then you should be fined, if you still don't pay you should be arrested, and if you're fucking stupid enough to reach the end of this whole chain of events and then attempt to murder the people coming to arrest you then I still don't think you should be killed, but if it's the only way to prevent the killing of others, it's the lesser of two evils.

If a democratically elected government decides to spy on their citizens' communications or drop bombs on innocent people from drones, does that make it acceptable?  Some, including me, would argue no.

I consider stealing to be taking something from someone by fraud, force, or threat of force.  It's wrong for anyone to do that as far as I'm concerned--individuals, businesses, corporations, governments, etc...

And you're claiming a flawed process can confer a legitimate mandate? (you're even using the word majority, a majority of which constituency? only the constituency that happens to be a minority of those that the vote affects, i.e. not democratic at all)

How can a democratically elected Government be said to be "stealing" exactly ? If they are stealing then surely they have a mandate to do so from the electorate ie. the majority. And so its not stealing is it ?
  Technically being the will of the majority doesn't necesarily make that will "right", I'll grant you. But then you have to ask - who exactly is the thief here ? How did entrepeneurship secure rights over the land - because as we all know, land is the source of all wealth ? How did entrepeneurship secure rights over labour ?

I'll grant you that the democratic process is flawed  (thats for another thread perhaps)- but still, it does beg the question doesn't it ?

Some would say that those who steal are the ones that are morally repugnant.

Hi.

Rights (including the ones I've listed as more important than property) are self-evidently not absolute. They depend on a large number of people being willing to uphold them. This includes the right of the majority to make laws - people are willing to defend that right because it's the best system we've found yet.

Apart from that, which is self-evident, surely it's obvious that I'm not claiming some kind of objectivity derived from a calculus? What I post represents my personal view. I'm not putting myself forward for dictator, I'm advocating a viewpoint.


You want to talk about morals? Theft is bad, sure, but if you withhold food from the starving or medicine from the dying then they will be precisely as dead as if you had shot them in the face. In other words, as I said, I believe the right to life supersedes the right to property. Denying the latter is 'theft', but denying the former is murder.

Oh, and "you will never get people to go along"? Have you tried polling to find out how many people agree with abolishing tax?


Well, naturally I believe that everyone's children should get a decent education, provided by government. This has absolutely nothing to do with bryant's rights, but the rights of his children - I believe every child has the right to a decent education, and they shouldn't be deprived of one because they were born to a parent who can't afford it (or thinks the government will use the opportunity to brainwash them with fluoride in the school dinners or some such).

Again, I'm not putting myself forward as the person who gets to decide levels and thresholds, I just opined that most people agree on what the basics are.

When people like me see the word tax they go apeshit.

This topic should be about INCOME tax only, I guess that way it would be less prone to flaming.

Rather then imposing tax on people, the gov should make money in other ways. Like running a state company for example. The best use I can think of - is to fine people/companies for different stuff, to improve things.

Let's say you local grocery store throws out spoiled products, which, it could sell if only the price would be more appropriate. But no. Greed led to spoiled products. Which is now fined in our glorious country. Next time the store manager will think twice between setting high prices or maybe will order less stuff. Or goes bankrupt, who cares. Another example - people on your block recycle less stuff, than required by law? Here comes the fine for everyone living on that block. And the government lives off those fines, amongst other sources of income.

Also the government cuts its military expenses by 80%, bureaucracy bullshit by 60%, election-associated stuff by 90% and so on.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hQXv-HCOw0c

Where I live, you can claim a decent amount of charitable donations back against your taxes at the end of the year.

There are middle grounds for this stuff, without abolishing taxation entirely.

Nothing whatsoever I disagree with here. We've been fucked hard by the financial services industry, and government hasn't helped.


Democracy isn't about letting everyone do things their own way, it's about choosing a common set of rules that benefit the most people. If rich people can easily choose not to pay any tax, the majority will.

I wouldn't call myself a socialist by the way - free markets are superb engines of growth that work really well in most situations. I just think it's naïve to think that the more you reduce government, the freer the markets will automatically be. Competitive markets in equilibrium are not naturally stable - they produce companies who are more successful, in whose interest it immediately is to drive competition out of business and form a monopoly. Government has a vital role to play in limiting the market share of large companies, and providing assistance to start-ups who would otherwise be prevented from competing due to the lack of economies of scale that larger companies have. I also don't think free markets work well with services that everyone should have by default - it's criminal that access to the best doctors or teachers is decided by how much you can pay.

My personal ideal government aside, I also think that the best way forward is to work to change the governments we have, not to secede and try to start from scratch.

The comments you've made on this thread are revealing.

You are a morally repugnant human being.

I cannot fathom how people can be so utterly selfish.

You equate not paying income tax to the government (wasteful) vs "caring for people". The two are not the same. Many people would prefer to choose how to spend their money caring for others directly. rather than having a government choose wastefully how to do so.

Do not assume people paying no income tax do not care for others.

Yep. True enough. Income tax is a sign of governments wanting to control you. It doesn't have to be that way, and plenty of people legally don't pay any income tax whatsoever.

There are more than a dozen nations with zero income tax rate. And what makes you think that I'm a resident of Qatar?

And there are dozens of countries which do not tax equity dividends and long term capital gains. 99.99% of my yearly income is from these sources.

I don't think its ok. But people are slaves to nation states. For now ....

Oh really? So you are going to come to my place to steal my money?

I'll be waiting for you, with my shotgun ready.

You mean the amount of money you really need, above which you could afford to lose some? I think most people do concur, if they're honest - the amount with which you can healthily feed an average family, rent a basic place to live, and pay the heating and electricity bills. Once you go beyond this, you're just making yourself comfortable, and when you go beyond that you're buying luxuries. It's incredibly important that people should be able to do that, but you can afford a % of your money to help your fellow humans.

As an aside, many people are currently taxed on incomes less than what you need to do this, which is wrong.


No, but survival comes first. Rights that ensure safety from violence (incl. freedom of speech) are most important, followed by the right to food, healthcare, housing and education. The right to property comes afterwards.

Well, in a way, it is. It's an agreement between a certain constituency of people. I think part of the solution is to make all countries much smaller, there's a natural upper limit to a workable voting population, and we've long since passed it. Big federations are not more efficient in practice, it just makes the governing class more attractive to people who want to collude with corporate buddies.


Like I said, no system is perfect. You can corrupt a small government system too. That doesn't mean that people should only be allowed to choose your way of solving the problems of communities and societies. And as I say above, influential government can use it's reach for harm or benevolence, and the harm can create an outcome that's no different from what you're saying is wrong with a small government system. Different means, same end. So you can't just point out the problems with one system, and then present something else as an idyll.

Take a look at where you agreed with me, and tell me if that isn't the very richest benefiting most egregiously at the expense of not just the poor, but literally everyone. That balance is even worse than what you're warning against; the top 1-5% taking more than 90% of the wealth, fraudulently. And with the government (that you say protects the interests of all) enabling them to do so. And they gave that assistance both before they wrung everything out of the money stream, and then afterwards too. You really think that a bit of stepwise modification will change that corporate-politic culture of mutual malfeasant backscratching?