I agree with you up to there. After that, I don’t think I’d make the same choices as you. Choice is good, but we have choices now, such as choosing to do away with the income tax.
However, choosing to do away with government also does away with choices (see God/rock/too heavy to lift). It’s rather immature reasoning to say democratic government takes away your freedom because you don’t agree with everything that results from the process.
Nevertheless, that is how Libertarians seem to view it. With their slogans like, “Democracy is four wolves and a sheep voting on what to have for dinner.” Which is bullshit, of course. IRL, democracy is four sheep and a wolf voting on what to have for dinner, because IRL the sheep outnumber the wolves, and that fact and democracy are the only defenses they’ve got.
You think a bunch of individuals are collectively stronger operating independently than working together? Evolution doesn’t say so. Damn those socialist chimps!
And Karl Marx must have had a time machine to go back and collectivize our primitive ancestors.
By living in this country you agree to abide by the will of the majority. If the US sealed its borders and didn’t let you leave, then you could complain, but you are free to find some other place where the onerous restrictions of taxation and law wouldn’t apply. Or, feel free to go to the desert or mountains and live off the grid. If you have no income, you pay no tax.
You’re just threadshitting at this point, and not actually engaging in the attempts to debate.
Of course, given your definitions of freedom, those that are literally unable to work (they exist, though rare) would have the choice between starving to death, death by exposure, or just suicide.
Right now some of my paycheck goes to pay taxes. In return for which, I have the freedome to drive anywhere in the country, on any road I want, for however long I want. I can cross most bridges with impunity. Freedom.
However, if Joe Bob’s Roads r Us doesn’t want my car to be on their roads (it’s an import), then I have less choice than I do now. If the only road to a location has a huge and prohibitive toll, I am denied that choice as well.
But as someone else said up the thread, the Libertopian ideal of free market roads is a pipe dream that doesn’t work in reality. Sadly, much like Libertopia itself.
Right now, you have to pay protection money if you’re in certain neighborhoods in return for which your business runs smoother and doesn’t burn down. Freedom.
Don’t fight the hypothetical. There are plenty of places in the US where homeowners have the responsibility to care for sidewalks and alleys, but do not own the sidewalk itself. I live in one such place.
So if an enterprising person managed to convince the government to sell the sidewalks to private entities, which would charge access fees to the sidewalk, are you saying the homeowners impacted by the sale would be more free than you are? Or do you maintain that they “[chose] the wrong place to live,” implying that they are less free than you with cost-free unrestricted access to your own sidewalk?
Are you concerned that people don’t really know the true cost of using sidewalks, and therefore should be compelled to pay per use of sidewalks, trails, thoroughfares, paths, tracks, and other walkways? Do you get upset at all the “free riders” who are taking advantage of perambulating on public right of ways without paying for it?
Yes, and those neighbourhoods are the ones with minimal government - which is what Libertarians hold up as an ideal. It’s a pretty good illustration of the difference between how Libertarianism is supposed to work in theory and how it actually works in the real world.
If my grandma had wheels she’d be a bus. Don’t fight the hypothetical.
I would say this government would be stopped by the homeowners before that happened.
Locally, people know very well what the costs are. I have absolutely no problem with local governments, local taxes, and local regulations. The key word is local.
Look around the world, Terr, at the countries where things in general go as well as or better than in the U.S., and at those where things go worse. One thing you won’t find in the former is small, limited government; one thing you won’t find in the latter is freedom, regardless of whether the government is overbearing or ineffectual.
Well, there’s local and then there’s local. I live in Texas. I suppose if the Mexicans choose to invade, it’s up to the local army to repel the invaders. If my local army isn’t up to the task, then I chose the wrong place to live. Hola, mis amigos.
Would you mind terribly if I borrowed the Federal army and had them repel my new Mexican overlords? I suppose I would have to come up with some sort of way to pay them. What is the going rate for liberating Texas from Mexico? I would gladly pay 1836 prices, but I expect the cost has gone up a bit since then.
Fortunately, since I do live in Texas, we are allowed to have our own guns. I sure hope that the Mexicans don’t arrive in tanks.
So you think privatizing sidewalks is a terrible idea that must be stopped. Why would local governments and homeowners be opposed to the freedom of paying to move around their locale? Why do you hate liberty? These private developers who want to own and charge for sidewalks are just trying to treat people like adults, rather than children. After all, adults should be grown up enough to pay for things like food, health care, and sidewalks. No more nanny state government subsidizing dog walking!! Let pedestrians pay their own fair share! I never get out of my full size SUV (I refuse to give a business without valet parking my patronage), so why should I pay taxes so other people can walk?
I never understood the “local is better” argument. It seems to be pretty much the opposite in reality. States needed to be dragged kicking and screaming to abandon Jim Crow, voter suppression, religious intrusion into public schools, etc. Local governments also tend to be more corrupt, both financially and in how they prosecute criminals. At one time whites could literally get away with murder. From a practical standpoint, there are staggering differences in the tax base available to local governments, with the result that the quality of education available to children depends on where they live. How does that make any sense at all?
And those “small government” states tend to suck: trailing the nation in education, health, income, teenage pregnancy, and other metrics. If it weren’t for the largess of the more progressive states they would suck even more.
It reminds me of the UHC argument: if you look around and see that every other country in the world has lower health care costs maybe it’s time to put down the ideology and face reality.
To be fair to some but not all small government types, they don’t actually care about whether the outcome is better or not. The “good” of limited government theoretically trumps other practical considerations.
Of course, I’d rather not deal with children with black lung, having a reasonable shot at getting medical care without going into hock, and driving on well maintained roads that are, at worst, minimally tolled, but I’ve been told I’m funny like that for preferring pragmatism to armchair philosophy.
I think the govt would function just fine without income tax. how much of those taxes actually come back to U.s during tax season. There is so many different type of taxes the govt wouldnt notice.
Look at states who don’t have a state tax. Texas has a really good economy but there are so many taxes that people have to pay, The states revenue goes up every year.
Texas has a good economy? Pull the other one, it’s got bells on.
We don’t have a good state budgeting system in Texas. For several years, we put on the appearance of one by using accounting tricks. As for taxes, we’ve got some very high property taxes to offset the lack of income taxes. And the last round of “fixes” to the tax code in 2006 led to the current poor situation in education funding. The state’s budget crisis was so bad, it necessitated the firing of tens of thousands of staff at schools across Texas. And we look to have a similar budget crisis brewing for the next biennial cycle.
As for revenue, Texas’ revenue went DOWN in 2009 (recession, remember?) and wasn’t all that great in 2010. Sure, it usually goes up, but the population has also exploded. On a per capita basis, Texas’ revenue performance hasn’t been all that impressive. Rick Perry has done plenty to wreck Texas’ budget for the next decade. It turns out we did create a lot of jobs. A lot of minimum and sub-minimum wage jobs. And even so, the unemployment rate hasn’t been significantly better than that conservative bastion of…Massachusetts. So, per capita-wise, not so good. There’s no need to get other states to emulate us when we’re not doing so great.
Also, take a look at the states that are net tax payers vs receivers. A lot of red states take in more federal money than they pay out. Where are the numbers for your assertions? All those farm states with agricultural subsidies would surely feel the effects of the disappearance of income tax revenue, not to mention every state that takes Medicare dollars (that is to say EVERY state).
Again, local regulations, local government and local taxes are not a problem, for me. Local is the keyword.
As mentioned earlier on in this thread, personal income tax, FICA, and corporate income tax account for 90% of US tax revenues. In other words, you’re completely wrong.
By no means do I advocate private roads in most cases, but there are plenty of examples of them in actual practice. Benefits may include more direct routes and faster travel times.
More generally, there are quite a lot of privately owned bridges. The alternative is often either a much longer route or a ferry ride. People can and do pay for the benefits.
And even public ventures are not isolated from the same principles; around here, you can pay an extra fee to drive in the HOV lanes.
Obviously these are isolated examples, but there seems to be a conversational gap between “all roads should be private” vs. “how would a private road ever work”? The fact is that they can and do work–some of the time.
Right, by “private roads” I meant replacing our current public highway system with intersecting roads owned by different businesses. I’m sure that there are markets for single isolated roads where the government, for whatever reason, hasn’t stepped in. I just don’t see the competition angle and how that world work in all but a few, few special cases.
Well local government is more efficient in that the people running it have more access to their constituetency (yes its spelled wrong). Similarly that is why small states are better off than the bigger states like California.
So do you want a local militia rather than a federal army?