The burden of proof is on the taxpayer. I, personally, have witnessed this, seeing arbitrarily assessed tax burdens of 5-10 times the amount of income. This person was in business for himself, and has to prove his “innocence”.
Also saying they “need” our tax information kind of eliminates the 4th Amendment in the IRS’ eyes, I guess. So, we have to “voluntarily” give that information up to stop 4th Amendment violations?
Maybe that would be “…had to prove…”
[quote]
Also saying they “need” our tax information kind of eliminates the 4th Amendment in the IRS’ eyes, I guess.
[quote]
Maybe because they’re not doing “search and seizure”, just asking you to provide your tax documents. Hmm…I wonder if you could refuse, but then the IRS could go to a judge and get a subpoena, so most people cooperate. I must admit I am ignorant of the exact processes the IRS uses in audits, though, and how exactly the 4th amendment fits in. I will have to look into this further (is there a tax lawyer in the house?).
Well, since the IRS has their own amendment, they are on at least an equal footing with the 4th.
But it’s really not a fault of the IRS that they need to see so much of your tax information. That fault lies directly with Congress. They are the ones to create the actual tax laws; the IRS just attempts to enforce them.
Part of why anyone listens to Steve Forbes’ goofy ideas on tax reform is that he at least promises to simplify the tax structure.
The point of this thread was supposed to be a debate over whether or not the US is a libertarian society based on the rationale SingleDad gave in his OP, namely that the American People own the American economy and thus are able to charge taxes as some sort of usage fee for it. I’m going to actually try to debate that point.
The basis for Libertarianism is that the economy is not a construct that can be owned by any entity, but rather is free for all to use. You may argue the veracity of this proposition, but in when you do so, you are unable to claim a Libertarian perspective. Basically, by definition, a society where there is any usage fee attached to the economy is therefore not a Libertarian society.
It probably comes down to what is an “unreasonable search and seizure”.
I am also curious about the wording of the 5th Amendment in regards to income taxes.
Does filing an income tax return make us a witness against ourselves? I am unaware of IRS auditing practices also, but the income tax return that we filed could be used against us. Which takes us to due process, does the auditing process void our due process rights?
Up the Irons!
Obviously you are correct. I’m pointing out a paradox. Either my understanding is incorrect, or libertarian theory contains some logical flaw.
For instance, if libertarians can arbitrarily declare that some item is free, then that contradicts another premise: that the arbitrary seizure of property is always wrong.
Against stupidity the very gods / Themselves contend in vain.
Oh, crap. That makes this a more challenging argument. I would say that your understanding of Libertarianism is slightly off. I would define Libertarianism (I’m not an expert, but my definition would at least keep it internally consistent in this regard) as a political theory under which all people are free to use their private property in any way they desire in accordance with the non-coercion principle and in which the government is an entity set up strictly to arrange for the defense of the country and enforcing the laws (which must, of course be made in accordance with the non-coercion principle).
The American economy is, by no stretch of the imagination, the private property of the American people. It could be public property, which doesn’t exist in a Libertarian society. In Libertarianism, the ability to interact freely with each other is a basic right of all people. The existence of an economy is a consequence of this, not the other way around.
waterj2: You can’t wriggle out that easily. You are still making a distinction without a difference between “private” property that is owned by many (a corporation) and “public” property that is owned by many (the economy).
To propose that the maintenance of a robust economy free of unforced coercion is not a service seems to imply an arbitrary definition of “service.”
Against stupidity the very gods / Themselves contend in vain.
Let me take a stab at it.
First, owning stock in a company does not make it a public company in the same way a park is public.
Every individual brought some of their property (intellectual or physical) to the table, and agreed on a way to split it up so that they each owned part of a specific entity.
A couple of points about this entity:
It came from individuals.
It was created on puporse.
It is definable. (makes a profit for specific people or it doesn’t)
This is not the same thing as claiming that the economy is a publicly owned entity.
The economy needs to be broken down into it’s smallest piece. Two individuals making an agreement between themselves. They are agreeing to trade X for Y. An economy can only be seen by stepping WAAAAAYYYYYYY back and ignoring the individual.
From out here, they seem like ants. You could crush one and the colony would continue just the same. The ants belong to the colony because they came from the colony. They are mindless little worker ants who don’t have anything to add to the colony except their effort. They OWE the colony for their lives.
Man can not fit this mold. Man needs to be be different, to interact with other men in the way he sees fit. He needs to controll the resources of his mind, and the fruits that they produce.
Government is a creation of man, not the other way around.
The economy only exists when individuals trade with other individuals. The collective US does not own the economy, it creates it. It is individuals that create it.
Still it is not anything concrete. What defines the economy depends on how far back you decide to step back. If you only walk back a little bit, you will only see the economy of a town, a little further, and you will see the economy of a state. Then a country, a continent, and finally the world economy.
The economy can not be defined in the real world. It cannot be assigned an owner, because everyone who trades creates their own economy the instant they trade.
If this post wandered a little bit more than usuall, it just goes to show I shouldn’t check the board before bed. 
Freedom:
True. And we created it. Earlier (you may have missed it) I asked if you thought that was valid or not. Can I assume you’d answer in the affirmative?
But government creates the circumstances within which an economy thrives or fails to thrive, and those circumstances can make a big difference.
For instance, take corporations. There’s nothing in the natural world that says the owners of a shared enterprise should be protected from liability for the sins of that enterprise; that’s completely counterintuitive. And (in the absence of that idea) anti-libertarian: libertarians are pretty strict about personal responsibility; corporations limit owners’ personal responsibility to the amount of their investment.
This is not to say that corporations shouldn’t exist; I believe that without the corporate form of ownership as structured in this and other Western countries, we would be a much, much less wealthy society. But without the government authorizing this restriction on liability, and deciding what tradeoffs were necessary to counterbalance that, we wouldn’t have this wealth.
So I think SingleDad has a point: to a large extent, the economic framework of our fair nation has been created and nurtured by ‘we, the people’, acting through our government, and I’d argue along with him that, as such, we have a certain ownership of that economic framework.
Freedom gives us some criteria for determining if some item may be owned:
[list=1][li]It came from individuals.[/li][li]It was created on purpose.[/li][li]It is definable. (makes a profit for specific people or it doesn’t).[/list=1][/li]
The economy does indeed come from individuals, “Two individuals making an agreement between themselves.”
The economy was indeed created on purpose. For example, money was invented specifically to make the economy efficient.
The economy is defineable: It will either make a profit for its owners, the people, or it will not. See Russia, SE Asia, Pakistan, the Phillipines under Marcos, etc. for examples of an economy not making a profit.
Any corporation can only be seen by stepping WAAAAAYYYYYYY back from Dilbert’s desk and ignoring the individuals.
If the collective US creates the economy, doesn’t it then by definition have ownership of it?
That’s as nonsensical as saying that everyone who writes creates their own language the instant they write.
Against stupidity the very gods / Themselves contend in vain.
I hate to quote myself, but it seemed like the easiest way to pick up where I left off:
Other such circumstances include how safe the country is from outside attack, how stable its political system is, the stability of its currency, and the existence of its currency. All of these factors are produced by the nation as a political unit. To me, it seems reasonable for the nation that has created favorable circumstances for creating wealth to say, “hey, wait, we had something to do with making this happen,” to the individuals and businesses that successfully took advantage of those circumstances. And then collect taxes from them.
No. The government does not create the circumstances. The people do. The people use the government as a tool to protect themselves and to maintain their freedom.
The government is a tool of the people. Giving them credit for anything is like saying the hammer owns the home because it was helpful in creating it.
If I said this you would have the name for the type of logic mistake I made
Just because money was made to make trading easier, does not prove the economy was a creation of anyone.
That is like saying that a natural river was created on purpose, with the example being that Dams were invented specifically to make them efficient and useful.
Money is just another tool that the people created and use the government to administer.
Ahhhh…We disagree here. There are no owners of the economy. You can not buy a piece of “The Economy.” Only owners of specific companies make or lose money.
By your line of reasoning…
We should take all the money earned during a year, and then split it up among all the people in the country. After all, we all own it, and we should either all make money or all lose money.
There is always someone making money and someone losing money in any economy. People have dumb ideas. A good economy will not make them money all by itself.
Actually, all you have to do is look at the papers of incorporation. You can see it that it exists right there. You can see the realationship everyone has, and what their responsibilities and rights are. These were all entered into knowingly and willingly by all parties.
I maintain that as a basic assumption, if it is not YOURS then you can not own it. Feel free to take whatever economy you can get your hands on and do whatever you want with it.
Then, leave my part of the economy alone. It will be very easy to determine what part is yours, and what part is mine. Just look in your bank account. All that is YOUR part of the economy.
This ignores the fact that the government came form all the people. It has a specific mission, to protect us and safegaurd our rights. We all know that we will benefit from it, that is why we create it.
Our reward and payment is FREEDOM.
Claiming ownership of the economy as a collective right is like argueing that the employees of Microsoft own the company. After all, they create the circumstances in which it works. Or maybe you and I should own Microsoft, after all, it is computer users who create the market place.
RTFirefly…
We are talking about you behind your back on the HCI thread.
That’s fine, but you’ll have to go on without me. The problem is, gun control is one of many issues I find worth discussing, but for people on the other side of the discussion, it tends to be the one they’re willing to pour all of their energies into. I can’t match that; I’m taking a break and debating other issues instead. Sorry. 
OK, I’ll go along with that - although with the caveat that government, as a tool, was indispensable for the things I’ve mentioned.
Seems backwards. You’ve just argued that it wasn’t the government, it was the people acting collectively, using the government as a tool. Collective action, collective creation of the indispensable framework, collective right of ownership.
This is very distinct from Microsoft, but you’ve got it reversed: in the case of Microsoft, there’s no question that Gates did in fact create the framework within which his employees work. While in the case of the U.S. economy, as you have agreed, ‘we, the people,’ in collective, concerted action, played the Bill Gates role. (And note that while Gates created the framework within which his employees work, we, the people, created the framework within which Gates works.)
Actually, the mission of the government, as set down in the Preamble of the Constitution, is a bit broader than that. See above.
And yes, government indeed came from all the people. But only from the people, the flesh-and-blood ones, that is.
Right now, IMO, the primary threat to freedom in this country is the increasing power of corporatocracy to dictate to individuals and government alike. The corporatocracy very definitely has the power to drastically reduce the extent to which individuals benefit from the economy, and the '90s amply demonstrated this fact. So just because we, the people, used government to create the framework within which our economy has prospered, doesn’t necessarily mean that the people will be the ones to benefit. (And if the people don’t benefit, then what’s the point? If it doesn’t ‘promote the general welfare,’ then the government has failed in an essential part of its mission.) The economy is ours, not theirs.
As Jim Hightower says, “The issue is basic: are the corporations going to rule, or are we?” I definitely want it to be us - and government is going to be our necessary tool in bringing the corporate world to heel.
The preamble to the Constitution does not ascribe all the things it mentions to the government. It says they are the purpose for writing the Constitution. Much of the Constitution is dedicated to limiting the powers of the government. The Constitution seeks to accomplish the securing the blessings of liberty etc. not only through government, but also through prohibiting government from doing certain things.
corporatocracy? New word to me. Anyways, corporations are rather dependant on people. The government can tax us, regardless of our opinion on the matter. If, say, Exxon wants money from me, they are not allowed to simply take it. I have to buy gas from them. Since I don’t even own a car, they’re SOL as far as that goes.
Corporations can and do give money to politicians to support their own agendas. The government will then do things which unfairly benefit corrupt corporations. And the solution to this is to increase the powers of government? Giving more power to the government will only give more power to those who buy the government.
The government is every bit as corrupt as any corporation you can think of. As the recent tobacco lawsuits demonstrate (oooh, there’s a Great Debate for another day), the government can get its way with corporations quite easily if it has the incentive (in this case, many billions of dollars).
Corporations are not some entity that is separate from the American people. The mission of government is not to regulate corporations. In the case where a corporation happens to break a law (which was made in accordance with the non-coercion principle, of course) the government should then deal with it.
Can you give me one example of a corporation that actually harmed society, and the situation was made better by government? And let’s constrain it to this country as well.
I’m not going to jump in and help the other side just now, but I am afraid that that last question may be a little too easy.
Should they limit their answer to 1, 5 or 10 examples?
First, I want to modify my original wording a bit. My use of “The Economy” was too imprecise. I would rather use the term “Marketplace”, herein defined as the physical, intellectual and legal infrastructure that enables individuals to engage in productive trade.
I also want to note that I’m not asserting that the government owns the Marketplace. The people do. The government is merely their agency for administering their property.
Freedom:
Of course you are correct. The critical invention is that of law. A well-defined system whereby two parties could engage in trade with reasonable confidence that their activity would be supported by the coercive powers.
And all you have to do is look at the Constitution.
waterj2:
Against stupidity the very gods / Themselves contend in vain.