Well, there are multiple things being asked here. Focusing on the corporate tax rate, I think it’s complicated…you can’t really say we have the highest tax rate, since there is a difference between the statutory rate, where we ARE one of the highest, to the actual rate paid…where we seem to be more in the middle of the pack. But the corporate rate is different than individual income tax and other taxes, so if you want to just focus on corporate taxes then you shouldn’t be talking about the 1%, as that implies more about other types of taxes. As for the corporate rate, I think that it impacts smaller or medium-sized businesses more than large corporations, so it’s hard to say whether lowering the rate across the board would be a good thing or a bad one. The US gets most of its tax revenue from other taxes than corporate, so I guess I’d need to see what exactly the cuts would be to know whether they would make a difference or not positive or negative. I could see how a cut to the corporate rate might encourage multinational companies to bring offices or manufactures here to the US which could be a positive thing and wouldn’t really cost the US government that much in revenue. It also might, depending on what we are talking about, help small and medium-sized businesses to grow…THEY aren’t sitting on large piles of cash, by and large. Of course, those large piles of cash that some very large companies are sitting on really doesn’t have much to do with the corporate tax rate anyway, so that’s a different thing really.
Your misunderstanding is probably because you are making assumptions based on things not in evidence. Stating that taxes are a drag on the economy doesn’t necessitate supporting anarchy. That’s the assumption you’ve made that your arguments have rested upon, and it’s an unsound foundation at best. If something doesn’t make sense based on the way you’ve understood the argument, rather than leaping at the opportunity to score some kind of gotcha points, I find it more useful to inquire so I can be sure I’ve understood what was being communicated.
It might seem not, directly.
But the premise assertion is unqualified:
If instead the assertion had been: - Excess “taxes are a drag.” DA #35
There’d be no quarrel.
Your disagreement with me does not logically demonstrate I misunderstand.
I understand so clearly I’ve been quoting the exact assertion, and defining terms by quoting the dictionary.
No.
I keep quoting it over and over.
B #42
Perhaps what you don’t understand is this simple and as yet unrefuted logical analysis.
Perhaps what you don’t understand is that a tax revenue of zero does not mean that a government is without revenue.
The premise may be imprecise, but you’ve assumed one possible interpretation while ruling out others. This has gone on for 4+ posts telling you you’ve interpreted it incorrectly. Why accept your assumption as gospel when there are much more plausible ones that make sense?
Just a tip, but interpreting generously goes a long way if you want actual discussion.
Taxes are a drag on the economy. At some level they are a net drag and at other levels they may be a net gain, but in all cases taxes will have an element of drag.
Help me understand this. If taxes are a drag, it would logically follow that removing all taxes would be a net positive for the economy.
a) I Understand.
b) SOME of what I posted might have lead to that belief. Thus
c) Some other that I posted was intended to make clear that tax alone is not NECESSARILY a government’s only revenue source, though that ends up a quibble over definition.
I’ve already quoted from Marrou in this forum multiple times. Here’s another:
The following excerpted from U.S. Presidential candidate Libertarian Andre Marrou’s
1992 stump speech.
In that case Marrou distinguished “INCOME tax”.
Distinguishing an “excise” from a sales tax?
If you continue to presume me ignorant and stupid, you’ll continue to be wrong.
-
It’s not an “assumption” (your word).
It’s reductio ad absurdum which reaches a false conclusion on the false premise. -
I’m not advocating anarchy. I’m undermining the UNQUALIFIED assertion that “taxes are a drag.” DA #35
-
I’m not the only one.
A #46 had done the same thing, and in much the same way. A #46, your syllogism is impeccable.
So is destroying our own valuable infrastructure.
But fear not. I’m hoping President Trump won’t start rolling our armored cav. & artillery down our Main Streets, simply randomly toppling buildings and other vital infrastructure.
That would be silly. Why?
For one thing, it would be a drag on the economy. So we don’t do it.
Therefore based on DA’s assumption which you have now corroborated, essentially all humanity is insane; for virtually all of us tax.
We choose to live in nations where taxation is standard, even though we could emigrate.
We vote for politicians that write or re-write tax code which we dutifully obey.
Our valued military allies, 28 NATO member nations ALL tax. How stupid we would all have to be if it were true that:
Ockham’s Razor:
7 Billion of us are all insane?
Or two misguided posters insisting on a conspicuously absurd premise are simply wrong.
I’ll meet you half way on it. I don’t agree with such a conspicuously absurd conclusion any more than you do.
But the logic of the syllogism is unassailed.
The conclusion is wrong, because the premise is wrong.
I have exposed the absurdity of:
I thank A #46 for the corroboration.
- Excerpted from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Third Edition © 1996 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Electronic version licensed from INSO Corporation; further reproduction and distribution in accordance with the Copyright Law of the United States. All rights reserved.
Taxes will always be a drag, but on balance they need not be a net drag. Think of it this way, unless taxation has zero negative effects, then there is a drag component. Zero taxes would not allow the government to function and that would probably be pretty bad for the economy, and 100% taxes would eliminate legal income and that would be bad for the economy as well. Somewhere between those there is a happy place that has a functioning government with a healthy economy. Where that level is can be an interesting debate. Saying that if you oppose higher taxation then you want anarchy, derp, is not interesting at all.
Think of minimum wage, if going from $6 to $10/hour is good, then going to $1M is better! uhh no, that’s silly. And it’s about the same quality response as introducing anarchy when talking about the detrimental effects of taxation.
It really is an assumption. Because in between your criticism, Damuri posted this in #37:
To which you responded:
In other words, the point that he was making is that taxes are a drag, but they may or may not be a net drag. It’s not a controversial stance at all. You’ve chosen to read it that way in post #43. You’ve assumed Damuri was talking about all taxes being a net drag, but that’s not what was said. Taxes are a drag - that’s a true, though imprecise statement. Taxes can be a net drag, or a net positive. And that was what was clarified multiple times.
No, it’s really not. What it is is a strawman and not a very good one. Let’s illustrate: You think taxes are not a drag, therefore taxes must be a net benefit, therefore if some taxes are a net benefit, then more taxes must be an even greater benefit. Obviously this means that taxes should be at 100%. That would be an absurd reading of what you’ve written and I’d be embarrassed to make that argument. But that’s the argument you’re making. And it’s of embarrassingly poor quality.
Again, this type of absurdity is tedious and uninteresting.
I’m glad at long last you’ve finally more or less come around to the position I’ve taken from the start.
I’ll go you several better.
- not merely not interesting, but also untrue.
- it is an absurdity that never would have occurred to me
- this I have not thought it, and did not post it.
By your logic, if a glass of ice water is a benefit to a thirsty man in the desert sun, the drowning in the middle of the ocean is an even greater benefit.
Yours is a false corollary. It may fool you. It doesn’t fool me.
Even if less of some bad things is good, that doesn’t mean an excess of good things is necessarily always better.
Having one wife is fine, so having ten wives is ten times as good ?! I don’t THINK so !!
** To paraphrase Oscar Wilde, the penalty for bigamy is two wives. **
Those are your words, not mine. But if you wish to become educated about the topic, hereis a short list of types of non-tax revenue.
Is it obvious that a state without taxes does not have to be a state without revenue. No quibbling about definitions needed. Thus your reductio fails. But even if it didn’t, you’d still be wrong. Because taxes being a drain is consistent with some taxes being better, overall, than no taxes.
Did you chance to notice that most of the items on your Wiki list of non-tax revenues, assume either an aggressive enslaving and conquering empire, or a Communist or Fascist state?
I personally don’t like taxes any more than anyone else does, but I wont accept fascism in order to avoid them.
The ones I posted in #47 suffice. Only ONE is needed to demonstrate a revenue potential beyond “tax”.
Marrou’s point precisely, and thus my point in quoting him in #47.
Excellent.
However you haven’t cited a single error yet.
No.
Not according to the rules of English grammar taught to me in K through college, and to me by my two professional writing parents.
This is an unqualified assertion.
- It does not say “some taxes”
- It doesn’t say “a drag, but a potential net benefit”
It’s simple, unqualified, and unambiguous:
If you wish to leverage your argument on the Marrou exceptions, for sake of brevity I’ll concede the point for now.
If you wish to pursue it in depth, I’m more than capable of explaining the linguistic rules I followed to arrive at my conclusion.
You can disagree with me.
But disagreement is not refutory proof.
Prove me wrong and I will eagerly concede.
So far nobody has laid a finger on me about it here.
If the premise I refuted was true, if:
then why do so many billions of our neighbors, friends, trading partners, and allies use them.
It would be a nation of fools if there was a presence in their economy that could be permanently eliminated with a stroke of the pen, but it refused to do so.
You’re welcome to call U.S. that if you wish.
But I know better. If half the people you know are below average, that means the other half is above average.
It is that latter half that would have ended taxation before it began, before 1776.
But it’s Pi Day (3/14) 2017, and U.S. governments are still taxing like bandits, and spending like drunken sailors.
Actually, this is the position you seemed to take issue with from the get go so your proclamation of ‘at long last’ is misplaced at best. Here, I’ll highlight it for you using the quote function:
And this is how you responded:
Look at that, multiquote! Amazing!
By failing to use the quote function and removing the context of the paragraph you were responding to, you mischaracterized the idea being conveyed, and responded with your own strawman about anarchy. Then you decided to double down even after multiple attempts to clarify, identifying a misunderstanding, etc. How trite.
Not really. The rest of your post is incoherent non-sequitur. I guess, cool story, bro?
Did you notice that this is false? There are twelve items listed - can you name the 7 or more that you think fit the criteria?
Neither will I. But I see you did not even attempt to refute this:
So that’s settled; your reductio fails.
I see this was a different poster. Reading fail on my part.
I see you haven’t been here long, but you may as well learn now that appeals to authority won’t get you far.
Taxes do not cause the net benefit. Net = Sum(drags) - Sum(accelerants). If taxes are a drag, they remain a drag. Let us imagine three countries: A, B, and C:
A: No tax
B: Raise $10MM tax. Burn it
C: Raise $10MM tax. Spend on highways and pirate-fighting. Maybe throw some public health initiatives and schools into the mix.
If we accept that taxes are a drag, then B and C have dragged their economy equally. C has accelerated it. C will end up with a net benefit if accelerant > drag. The drag is the same for both B and C even if there is a net gain for C. It’s simple, unqualified, and unambiguous.
Because
I don’t think we are having the same conversation.
The ones from 40% to 30% have probably done more harm than good.
ALL taxes are a drag.
No, you’ve been ignoring everything after the statement that taxes are a drag.
Do you see the part where I say that
GOVERNMENT SPENDING IS AN ACCELERANT AND THE NET EFFECT DEPENDS ON WHETHER THE ACCELERANT EFFECT OF GOVERNMENT SPENDING OUTWEIGHS THE DEADWEIGHT LOSS OF TAXES
Taxes are a drag on the economy. There is no question about this. This isn’t opinion, this is about as close as you get to math in economics.
Not if that means you also eliminate government spending.
Lets assume balanced budgets:
So the first dollar of taxation has almost no drag.
Spending that first tax dollar creates much more economic activity than the drag created by that first dollar of taxation.
As taxes increase, each additional dollar of taxation creates more drag than the last.
As government spending increases, each dollar of government spending creates less benefit to society than the last.
At some point an additional dollar of taxes will create more drag than an additional dollar of government spending. Sometime before we reach this point we will want to stop increasing taxes because with all things being equal, a capitalist society has a preference for private activity over public activity.