This is a perfect illustration of Big Brother thinking.
I don’t know whether you realize it, but what you’re really saying is that you believe that you should have control over how much of my money I get to keep. And you might possibly allow me to keep a little more of my own money IF–AND ONLY IF–I can demonstrate to your satisfaction that I have a legitimate use for my own property.
What taxes are you compelled to pay just for being born?
“I like paying taxes. They buy me civilization.”
It turns out other people have different ideas about the proper functions of government. In a democracy, they also get to have a say.
Even on this board people have different ideas about whether ‘services’ such as police and fire should be government or privatized, so declaring X to be the job of Government and Y not to be is pretty much a matter of opinion, not fact.
Are you saying countries don’t impose exit costs on people who want to leave? Because they do.
Sure, but are those ideas supportable by something more rigorous?
Do they kill and cripple people for trying to leave?
That money has value only because “Big Brother” made it and maintains the system that makes it valuable, and you can only keep any of it because “Big Brother” stops everyone else from grabbing it. And the same goes for the rest of your property.
I don’t agree that it’s (or should be) so much a matter of opinion. Whether something should be paid for by tax money or not can be looked at through the necessity and ‘public goods’ framework. Two questions - 1) Is it necessary? 2) Is it a public(or quasi public) good?
If so, taxation should pay for it. Sanitation, for instance, is a great place to put tax money. Tertiary healthcare is not.
Exit costs are exit costs. I’m saying the two things have many similarities, not that they are the same and should be treated as such.
According to the preamble to the Constitution, one of the things the government is supposed to do is “promote the general welfare.”
A general comment, not directed at anyone in this thread: it makes me physically ill to realize that some people think it’s more important for Mitt Romney to have $401 million rather than $400 million in the bank, than it is to use that million to literally make the difference between life and death for 100 people who can’t afford proper food, shelter, or medical care.
There’s plenty of people who think that if those 100 people can’t survive on their own, they deserve death.
Right here:
Suppose I own and operate a shopping mall. It has a lot of operating costs, including paying for many amenities that attract shoppers. The steady stream of shoppers makes it a desirable place for many companies to set up shop, despite the fact that I make them sign contracts to pay me money in exchange for the right to do business in my mall. I have very little trouble attracting tenants who agree to my terms, but many other potential tenants don’t like my terms and take their business elsewhere. Some of my revenue goes toward making the mall a good place to do business, and the rest I spend however I please. One day, someone decides to set up one of those wagon-looking kiosks in the middle of a walkway and sell some crummy jewellery, all without my permission. I say, “Hey! You’re not allowed to do business within these walls without my permission. If you want my permission, you have to pay me. Otherwise, you have to find somewhere else to do business.” Is that extortion?
Well, up until they become one of that hundred.
I have very little choice, since nearly any home I could buy would have a similar association. You get born into a country, but you don’t pay taxes until you would have an opportunity to leave. Sure it is inconvenient, but so is not buying a house anywhere near my work. And just like with the government, I use some of the benefits of the association but not all.
In California many taxes need super majorities. Why does the vote of a person voting no count for more than that of a person voting yes? Spending money, which is your example, does not. And what majority is to your liking?
As I said the purchase of gas is not voluntary. Even if I chose to take public transportation I would still be purchasing gas indirectly. The price of gas has little to do with the benefit. In California we frequently suffer from artificial shortages caused by several refineries cutting back at the same time, and thus increasing the price of gas. We all pay more depending on the market, which also has little to do in the short term with the gas itself. In general the money I pay into Social Security is going to give more value than the money I pay for gas. Plus I don’t get to vote for the price of gas on the world market, I don’t get to vote on the policies of local refineries, I don’t get to vote for OPEC, and I don’t get to vote on the profit margins and salaries of oil company execs.
I do pay a premium here for gas which is cleaner than normal gas, and in return the smog problem has almost vanished. That was a democratically imposed mandate, and that returns far more than the tax we pay for oil company shenanigans.
I don’t consider either to be extortion, to make myself clear. Through the circumstances of living in our society we do a lot of stuff we’d rather not do. But at least we get to vote on our taxes.
What do you want me to cite for you? My Macro Econ 101 class from business school? Google John Maynard Keynes. Google Adam Smith for that matter. I don’t think there’s a single legitimate economist who doesn’t believe that government doesn’t have some role in the economy.
That’s not what you said. Of course government has a role to play in the economy. That role is usually not delivery of services, unless you’re counting the military, police, courts and the like.
Typical example of anti-democratic thinking. Every one of the horrible things the government does which you don’t believe in got voted in by a majority of our elected representatives and have not gotten repealed. Back 50 years ago when Medicare was passed medical care was relatively primitive but cheap. I’m looking forward to getting covered (and I paid for it) and I’m glad that my 97 year old father in law has good coverage for a good quality of life.
I’m happy we’re spending money on research. Sure there is noise in the system, but I think the will of the people should trump the opinions of a tax hating minority.
Being taxed for the stuff you like is just as much extortion as being taxed for the stuff you don’t like.
That’s the way the Founders intended it to be:
If you don’t like the Constitution, just say so.