Let's bury the "Taxation is theft" meme once and for all

[Xan]

I think I was one of those people who said that taxation was theft.

I don’t think like that anymore.

The Government is inefficient because no one one expects it to be. We don’t demand that it become inefficient.

I think schools, roads, the military (although I don’t think it needs to be as big as it is), police, and yes some sort of public health care option.

My general philosophy is that as long as you aren’t hurting someone else or their property you should be able to do whatever you want.

[DirkGntly]

Not all taxation is theft, to my eyes, but some forms of taxation might as well be. Let’s take personal property tax, for example, as regards my pickup truck (not all states have personal property tax).
Here in Missouri, I purchase a vehicle, and I pay a sales tax on it at time of purchase, or within 30 days of purchase. If I’ve paid for the vehicle in full, I am delivered a copy of the title from the state indicating that I am the owner. Unfortunately, I will also pay a percentage of the vehicle’s price every following year as a tax. What makes this problematic, is that if I refuse to pay the tax, the state of Missouri will come and confiscate my vehicle, even if I have parked it and no longer drive it. This means that for all intents and purposes, Missouri actually owns my vehicle, and I rent it from them every year. Somewhere, somehow, Missouri managed to “steal” my truck from me.
On the other hand, in Texas for example, there is a license and registration fee imposed every year. If I don’t drive the vehicle, I’m not obligated to pay the fees, and I keep my vehicle. If I choose to drive it again, I pay the fees, get my new tags and go merrily down the road that my license and registration fees just paid for…THIS seems like an equitable system, and the government doesn’t rent my vehicle back to me every year…

[Frank]

@DirkGntly

Here in Missouri, I purchase a vehicle, and I pay a sales tax on it at time of purchase, or within 30 days of purchase. If I’ve paid for the vehicle in full, I am delivered a copy of the title from the state indicating that I am the owner. Unfortunately, I will also pay a percentage of the vehicle’s price every following year as a tax. What makes this problematic, is that if I refuse to pay the tax, the state of Missouri will come and confiscate my vehicle, even if I have parked it and no longer drive it. This means that for all intents and purposes, Missouri actually owns my vehicle, and I rent it from them every year. Somewhere, somehow, Missouri managed to “steal” my truck from me.

Technically, it’s the county that will come steal it from you. It’s not a state tax.

I’ve only been here just over a year. Can you cite that your car will be seized if you don’t pay that tax?

[Guinastasia]

@elucidator

And don’t even get me started on plenary indulgences! Just one of the 95 feces nailed to the door…

That’d be awful messy, wouldn’t it?

[Captain_Carrot]

@Scylla

The OP is arguing that conservatives in general as a group are making the claim that taxes being spent on things they disagree with constitutes theft. In fact, this is such a broad and constant claim that it requires burial in the pit, according to him.

I read it more as “conservatives claim that taxation is theft, which argument is emotionally spurred by spending on programs they think are unnecessary or harmful.”

[elucidator]

@Guinastasia

That’d be awful messy, wouldn’t it?

Well, a staplegun is no improvement, and duct tape is right out!

[Liberal]

@Voyager

Ah, but if they said taxation is immoral, or taxation is unethical, they’d be making a moral or ethical statement which can be argued. But saying “taxation is theft” is making a legal statement, since theft is illegal (even when it might be moral - starving mothers stealing bread and all that.) Since in our country taxation is done only with the will of the majority (or a supermajority in California) I reject equivalence with muggers. Taxation is more of a contract with the government, agreed to on our side (as in shrink wrapped licenses) by making use of the product/staying in the country. I feel comfortable saying it is a contract since the taxpayer gets something back, unlike the person robbed. The situation in a monarchy would be something different, and there might be an argument for taxation being like theft there, especially if there were not free egress.

We can call induction slavery, we can call being forced to stop at a traffic light bondage, but that doesn’t make them true.

In fact, I’d turn it around. Most people who claim taxation is theft still agree that government does fulfill some valid functions, such as defense and police work. Since they don’t appear to have any way of paying for such without taxes, they either agree that taxation is okay, and the only problem is that they are paying for stuff they don’t like (already covered in this thread) or they wish to not pay taxes but still have the protection of the military, in which case they are effectively stealing services from the rest of us who do pay. So, I’d argue that not paying taxes is the true case of theft.

Yeah, Joe Biden said not paying them is unpatriotic. His statement derailed Obama’s campaign for a day or two, when the latter was hoping to focus the media on his economic agenda.

I agree with you that the ethical argument can be made — assuming it’s made in the manner I made it, or some similar manner. I also agree with you that taxation is not legally theft. But this is one of those cases where I think people talk past each other a lot. The taxes-are-theft side is making (or attempting to make) an argument about morality and ethics, while the taxes-are-okay side is making (or attempting to make) an argument about law.

Now this can get tricky, and the equivocation can splatter all over everything on account of law being a subset of ethics (similar to the manner in which ontology is a subset of metaphysics, or science is a subset of epistemology). People attempting to make a legal argument are dead in the water. There isn’t even a place to stand. No reasonable legal argument can be made.

But that’s not because of any Constitution, or any amendment, or any social contract imposed by the majority (or supermajority). It’s because, in ordinary real world politics, to govern is to control. (Ideally, to govern would mean to protect.) And since, as I said before, goverance in the ordinary sense goes back to the right of kings (and probably before that to the guy with the biggest muscles or the brightest brain, whichever won out).

Speaking for myself, it is only the ethical argument that concerns me. The legal argument is a non-argument. This is easily proved by a series of logical modus ponens: if you refuse to pay your taxes, you will be warned; if you still refuse to pay them, in some cases you will be visited by the IRS; if you still refuse to pay them, your wages will be garnisheed and you will be arrested; if you resist arrest, you will be met with force; if you resist the forces arrayed against you, you will be maced, tasered, or shot and killed — whatever is required to drag your resistant body to a court of law or to a morgue.

Therefore, a legal argument is moot. But an ethical argument wins.

[Frank]

@Liberal

I agree with you that the ethical argument can be made — assuming it’s made in the manner I made it, or some similar manner.
…

But an ethical argument wins.

But yet, you’ve made your ethical argument, and it does not appear to have won.

[Guinastasia]

@elucidator

Well, a staplegun is no improvement, and duct tape is right out!

I guess you could take some Kaeopectate (spell?) first.

[LeeshaJoy]

@Frank

But yet, you’ve made your ethical argument…

He has?

[Der_Trihs]

@Liberal

The taxes-are-theft side is making (or attempting to make) an argument about morality and ethics, while the taxes-are-okay side is making (or attempting to make) an argument about law.

It seems like the opposite as often as not to me. The pro-taxes side often justifies taxes by saying that you should pay what you owe, and that not paying taxes makes you a parasite on the society you are benefiting from. That’s a moral not a legal argument. Meanwhile, the taxes-are-theft people are fond of spurious legal claims that they don’t have to pay taxes, the the federal government doesn’t have the legal right to tax and so on.

[Scylla]

@Captain_Carrot

I read it more as “conservatives claim that taxation is theft, which argument is emotionally spurred by spending on programs they think are unnecessary or harmful.”

Which… looks ok. I may be missing your point as that doesn’t seem all that different from interpretation, and is still an assertion that, made by the OP would certainly benefit from an example or two. Fair enough?
Perhaps I’m wrong. Perhaps there are tons of conservatives flooding the interweb with this argument, and I’m not aware of it. I don’t discount the possibility. The first time somebody here mentioned the birthers here, I thought “No fucking way. Nobody’s saying that.”

So, maybe I’m wrong here.

Is this a common argument from conservatives, or a straw man the OP is beating on?

“Obama Birth certificate” were easy search terms that demonstrated that there is in fact a whole bunch of Republican/conservative morons making that argument.

Sincerely, where are the idiots making the argument the OP is bitching about?

[Frank]

@Scylla

Sincerely, where are the idiots making the argument the OP is bitching about?

In fairness, the “taxation is theft” crowd was just as vociferous and idiotic during the Bush adminstration as they are now.

But also in fairness, the “the solution to everything is to lower taxes” crowd is easily conflated with the group I mentioned above.

[elucidator]

The most common cry I hear on the boards is something like “How come you have the right to take what’s mine and give it to lazy drug addicts?!”

I don’t take it personal, mind you, I was bone lazy long before I even heard about drugs.

[Scylla]

@Frank

In fairness, the “taxation is theft” crowd was just as vociferous and idiotic during the Bush adminstration as they are now.

I missed it then, too.

But also in fairness, the “the solution to everything is to lower taxes” crowd is easily conflated with the group I mentioned above.

…and not exactly a majority of liberal/dems in that group. If I read you correctly you are suggesting that the OP is under a misapprehension by equating to unrelated groups into a single argument and tilting at a windmill, then I agree.

Though I’m guessing you’ll tell me that’s not what you’re saying.

[Scylla]

@elucidator

The most common cry I hear on the boards is something like “How come you have the right to take what’s mine and give it to lazy drug addicts?!”

On these boards? Are you insane?
The most common cry I hear is “look at my cute kitty pictures.” That’s followed by “I burning your dog,” “where’s my foreskin?” “WMD,” “Lewinsky,” “____is/are a Nazi?Hitler,” "Only an idiot would call “____Nazi/Hitler.”

“You gave my tax dollars to a lazy drug addict” isn’t even in the top 100.
In fact, I will make you a bet. An honorable bet. A challenge that you cannot produce a cite to a poster making that argument on this board in the last 12 months.

Name thy terms.

[Der_Trihs]

@Scylla

@elucidator

The most common cry I hear on the boards is something like “How come you have the right to take what’s mine and give it to lazy drug addicts?!”

On these boards? Are you insane?
The most common cry I hear is “look at my cute kitty pictures.” That’s followed by “I burning your dog,” “where’s my foreskin?” “WMD,” “Lewinsky,” “____is/are a Nazi?Hitler,” "Only an idiot would call “____Nazi/Hitler.”

“You gave my tax dollars to a lazy drug addict” isn’t even in the top 100.
In fact, I will make you a bet. An honorable bet. A challenge that you cannot produce a cite to a poster making that argument on this board in the last 12 months.

Name thy terms.

I don’t gamble so I won’t take that bet, but I’d withdraw the offer if I were you. Just searching the histories of some of the board’s more libertarian members is sure to come up with lines like that, and worse.

[LeeshaJoy]

Pick any random post by curlcoat. The odds are good that it’ll be expressing a sentiment very similar to what elucidator said.

[Frank]

@Scylla

If I read you correctly you are suggesting that the OP is under a misapprehension by equating to unrelated groups into a single argument and tilting at a windmill, then I agree.

Though I’m guessing you’ll tell me that’s not what you’re saying.

If we’re agreeing that the OP was aiming at the wrong target, (the target being the latter group of my post), it’s close enough.

[elucidator]

…Name thy terms.

What are you, were-Amish? Full moon comes out, you start talking like Pauly Shore doing Cotton Mather?

And I want to get into a parsing contest with you? Again?

The actual wording is, of course, a bit of a joke. But, sure, many’s the time I’ve seen the approximate sentiment of “what gives you the right to take my rubber ducky and give it to my little brother? Its MY rubber ducky!”

But all it boils down to is a exaltation of property rights above all others, and that is such a common dogma amongst conservatives that they don’t even notice it any more, its one of those things everybody knows, and nobody questions.

But its isn’t, it’s pure theory, its a leap of secular faith. We hold these truths to be self-evident. We don’t have a good reason, we don’t need any stinking badges, we award these rights to ourselves and to each other because we say so. I got zero problem with that. Yep, we made it up. Audacity, its what we’re good at.

So, anyways, if its just a matter of asserting that private property rights trump and out weigh the collective well-being? I refer you to the Thread That Wouldn’t Die, on this very forum.