Should Conscientious Objectors be able to "opt out" of funding the military?

[Lust4Life]

@Blalron

Just as people who hold sincere pacifistic beliefs can obtain “Conscientious Objector” status and avoid being drafted into combat, I think it would be fair to allow CO’s to “opt out” of funding the military.

In order to ensure that people will do this due to their beliefs instead of to reduce their tax liability, the person will pay exactly the same amount as they normally would in taxes, except none of their tax dollars will go to The Pentagon.

Yeeeeeees interesting concept !
Can people refuse to risk their lives to defend the system that protects their freedom while others do so AND after being indulged on that ,start dictating where their tax is going to be spent !

IBreak into your house AND have you cook me dinner AND I want you to give me some money when I leave ?
I dont think so .

[Lynn_Bodoni]

@Lemur866

I believe Fred Pohl or some other science fiction writer had the idea that for an extra 1% tax payment you could designate 10% of your taxes would have to go to a particular program. Pay 2% extra and you get 20%, and so forth.

So if you’re willing to pay 10% more taxes, you could specify that 100% of your regular tax bill would go to fund hospitals for homeless kittens, or what have you. The extra 10% would go to general revenue.

Not sure how low-level you could make this, otherwise you’d have people funding “repair the sidewalk in front of my house” projects. But it would be cool to at least send it to NASA or NSA or DHHS, or what have you.

It was Fred Pohl, and you could only designate 90% of your taxes, so that the gummint had at least 10% that couldn’t be allocated, and could be budgeted as they see fit.

Pohl also wrote about a system where people did some work in lieue of taxes…for instance, during the Katrina mess, everyone who opted to work instead of pay cash money for taxes would have been expected to report in for duty. Work assignments would take into account the ability of a worker (doctors, for instance, might practice medicine as part of their service, on a regular shift AND on emergency calls, but unskilled workers might find themselves doing cleanup). Instead of paying legal fines, too, people could bargain for work, something like community service.

[Sage_Rat]

To give a factual answer to the OP, yes there should be a way, and yes there is a way.

If you are not happy with the laws of your country, then you can either seek to change them through whatever processes are available by which to change them, or you can change your country of citizenship. This is the official and only way to opt out of the law of the land. But it is a way and isn’t illegal nor even frowned upon. And it does result in allowing the product of your labors to not go into financing a government which you don’t agree with.

[DSYoungEsq]

@Sage Rat

To give a factual answer to the OP, yes there should be a way, and yes there is a way.

If you are not happy with the laws of your country, then you can either seek to change them through whatever processes are available by which to change them, or you can change your country of citizenship. This is the official and only way to opt out of the law of the land. But it is a way and isn’t illegal nor even frowned upon. And it does result in allowing the product of your labors to not go into financing a government which you don’t agree with.

Not if you continue to live in the United States, it doesn’t. :rolleyes:

[Sage_Rat]

@DSYoungEsq

Not if you continue to live in the United States, it doesn’t. :rolleyes:

True… I would imagine that that’s well enough understood from what I wrote though. :dubious: