And if they proselytize or advocate for political positions during their charity work?
I’m not sure I see what that matters. I work for a not-for-profit corporation; if in the course of doing my work I mention that I believe in a certain political stance, why should that affect my company’s tax status?
When you don’t pay taxes, you shouldn’t have a say in how tax money gets spent.
That’s kind of scary as a concept. Sort of like a poll tax justification.
So I assume you then support taking away the vote from the millions of low-income Americans who pay no taxes?
I suppose you can come up with an example of someone who’s never paid taxes before? If they work, they pay taxes. If they live somewhere besides under a bridge they pay taxes. I’m talking about advocating on behalf of a company that doesn’t pay taxes while on the clock. They can’t do it for candidates and still keep tax-exempt status - why should it be ok for them to advocate positions on legislation?
Not to mention that the individual clergy themselves do pay taxes, and so they would still have a say in what the government does.
I imagine that the world would keep on turning if churches paid property taxes. Too, I think that they probably should.
As to:
What with the latest pissing match amongst Episcopalians over whether or not homosexuality should be recognized or not, I believe the courts have thus far said that the property belongs to the national diocese. This may very well change, though.
As to the power play in St Louis: wow. Chutzpah from all parties, it seems.
Not really. If low-income people work, they pay only payroll taxes. They do not pay income taxes. You only pay income taxes if your income reaches a certain level. There are millions of Americans who do not pay income taxes because they do not earn enough money. Furthermore, there are quite a few welfare recipients who do not pay taxes. Should they be denied the franchise?
If they rent, they only pay property taxes indirectly. They may pay sales tax (depending on the state), but many nonprofits also pay sales taxes.
Depending on the structure of the non-profit, they can’t spend much of their money lobbying. Most non-profits spend very, very little on influencing legislation.
If churches paid taxes, I would expect a new transdenominational wave of doctrinal evolution all tending towards the proposition that low property taxes are part of God’s plan.
It’s not the same thing; there is no legal “seperation of not-for-profit corporation and state”; there is the legal principle of seperation of church and state.
Churches would never pay taxes any more than corporations pay taxes. End users, all of whom are people, pay taxes. If you start levying taxes against simple churches like the Episcopal churches I went to for 30 years (property taxes, let’s say) the vicar would simply ask for another dollar every Sunday to render unto Caesar, the senior warden would mention taxes when he made his annual stewardship rounds, and people would deduct one more dollar on their income tax returns (unless you simultaneously disallowed church gifts as charitable contributions.) It would be simpler and easier to just raise taxes across the board. Atheists would scream bloody murder if we knew it was to avoid taxing churches, but there are only a few dozen of us and we never vote as a bloc anyway. :rolleyes:
It’s true that some churches, congregations and religious orders own lucrative properties – resorts, retreats, rental properties and even theme parks. If they charge people to use them, they would just charge more to pay the taxes; if they don’t charge to use them (eg. for benefit of clergy or retirees) they’d go back to the pews for more money.
The only other purpose of taxation to enforce morality. Tobacco and liquor are taxed heavily to raise revenue, of course, but public officials assuage their consciences about it by believing they’re keeping a lid on the consumption of these things by levying punitive taxes. I am told by some of my old newspaper buddies in Nevada that legal houses of prostitution there pay dearly when the taxman comes knocking (and he does’t take it out in trade.) And I do know that the casinos here in Colorado are onerously taxed, and assume that those in other states are, as well. But would morality would be enforced by taxing churches?
In addition, it is important to remember that some churches have incorporated as businesses, and therefore are subject to the same taxation rules as corporations. So before you rail against the local nondenominational megachurch not paying taxes, I’d double check to make sure they don’t.
Yes, in my opinion, if they were taxed to the point of destruction. Just as many Catholics would like to tax Protestant churches under, and Protestants the Catholics, and so on. Which is one reason why the seperation of church and state exists in the first place, and why a church should be treated evenhandedly, like any other group.
Well, in my case I’m not talking about megachurches - we don’t have one of those in town. (You have to drive a couple miles out of town for that.)
Obviously, these aren’t shoestring, rural churches either.
Just your basic middle-to-upper-middle-class churches. Methodist, Southern Baptist, Church of Christ, First Baptist, etc.
One difference would be that property tax funds are usually administered locally, rather than federally. I don’t really care if the funds are written off on income tax as donations if the town gets additional funding from the property tax.
In my ideal world, churches could be set up as non-profit organizations, just like any other group that wants to operate a charity. One of the requirements for NPO status would be open books, so that anyone could see exactly where the money was going. That way the churches who actually do put their money into charity work could be nonprofit and not pay taxes just like they do now.*
The million-dollar megachurches could do the same thing, but I suspect that their membership might fall off a bit if they were actually held accountable for their spending. If they were afraid to have open books, no problem, just pay your taxes like the rest of us.
*However, I’d still think that a members-only gym wouldn’t qualify as a non-profit charitable activity.
Actually, according to a book my sister-in-law was reading over Christmas, being taxed to the point of destruction would actually be a good thing for Christianity, if not for churches. Something about how when God’s Chosen People are welcomed into society, their faith becomes weak and bland and it becomes hard to tell the difference between the Christians and the Others. But when God’s Chosen People are marginalized and persecuted, their faith becomes stronger, and more distinctive. (I believe that part of the evidence was related to what happened to the Hebrews when they were enslaved in Egypt. Yes, my sister-in-law is a Biblical Literalist.)
On the other hand, how would you tax churches to the point of destruction? I can see how one might apply property tax and force a number of churches, especially those with smaller, older congregations to give up their church building (or those in rural or urban neighborhoods). I suppose one could apply an income tax to money collected in the offering plate, but unless you take away the general not for profit status of churches, it’s more likely to cause a paperwork shuffle than it is so much lost income that the church(community of like-minded believers*) will cease to exist. (IMO).
(*Thank you Polycarp, this definition of “church” is a little more dignified than the song running through my brain. . . . I am the church, you are the church . . . )
It’s worth pointing out that Madison, one of the chief architects of the 1st amendment, did interpret it such that he didn’t think churches should get special exclusions from property taxes just because they were churches. While that by no means settles the matter (Madison may have worked on the language, but he’s not the one only that debated, agreed upon a certain version, and passed it), it certainly does show that it’s one plausible interpretation of the language, rather that what you imply: clearly against it.
Myself, I think there should simply be a basic exclusion for non-profits big enough to encompass most churches and church charities (the ones that actual function as churches rather than shilling for Pat Robertson’s diet shake) but that is not specifically or specially dependent on something being a religion or not. That would allow us to simply help keep the government out of having to define what a religion is or isn’t altogether, which while we can’t avoid it entirely, is generally a good idea. We mostly already have this, in fact.
Actually, Federal tax-exempt status and state non-profit organizations aren’t limited to “charitable activity”. (IRS Pub 557 has a long list, which includes unions, fraternities and credit unions , among other non-charitable organizations.) The Federal tax exemption is available to sport clubs and country clubs under the category of social and recreation clubs- and they will lose the exemption if they aren’t members only. Each state has its own rules for non-profit status. If the YMCA member-only gym qualifies as non-profit and Federal tax-exempt, I don’t see why a members-only church gym shouldn’t.
It was the thread.
Not that I’ve seen in the various non-profits I’ve worked for.