Shared income

[ebia]

A choice between going to a nonexsitant country (unless you can find one that doesn't press taxes; and since pretty much all land has been claimed by someone or another by now starting a new country is out of the question), or casting a vote for a candidate that will never run, much less win. How generous.

Face it. No matter how you justify taxes the fact remains: taxes are inescapable and a unnegotiable part of goverment. They might be necessary, or good, or ultimately beneficial or anything else, but to act like they are justified through the consent of ever citizen is just disconnected from reality.

Well, yes, there are some practical difficulties if one doesn't consent and chooses to renounce one's citizenship instead. I guess most people decide that the benefits of citzenship outweight the costs.

 

[MachZer0]

Then you have a choice of leaving or electing a government that doesn't raise taxes.

It isn't a matter of mere taxation but of taxing one person for the benefit of another.

 

[MachZer0]

Well, yes, there are some practical difficulties if one doesn't consent and chooses to renounce one's citizenship instead. I guess most people decide that the benefits of citzenship outweight the costs.

None of what you have said justifies your contention that I, or anyone, has consented to taxation

 

[Goodchild]

A plan that would have everyone in America making the same amount of money. A McDONALD'S worker makes the same amount as a Doctor, or a lawyer. I personally believe that would help to decrease poverty and unemployment rates.

Wouldn't work, humans just aren't geared that way.

I've played around in my head though with the idea that tightly defined pay scales for all jobs with lower and upper limits for each job, where the highest paying job is no more than three or four times the amount of the lowest paying job. Something like that might eliminate the poverty gap while still encouraging the highly qualified to seek out the most complex and difficult jobs.

 

[MachZer0]

Then you have a choice of leaving or electing a government that doesn't raise taxes.

That still does not address the issue of consent.

 

[MoonlessNight]

Well, yes, there are some practical difficulties if one doesn't consent and chooses to renounce one's citizenship instead. I guess most people decide that the benefits of citzenship outweight the costs.

So then how is this consent any different from consent given from the end of a gun?

 

[chaz345]

The right to impose taxes (in accordance with any constituion and laws) is one of the things you are deemed to consent to as a citizen.

What about the rights of the taxed to have input on how that money is used?

Wasn't a lack of input on what taxes were used for one of the driving forces in the formation of the country?

Consent to be taxed is a far different thing that consent relating to what those taxes are used for.

Taxes are to be used for the good of all of society, the rich as well as the poor. If one wants to have an income "sharing" system such as proposed in the OP, then make a case for how such a system benefits ALL of society, including the rich from whom the money is coming.



Let's engage in a little fantasy here. Instead of money let's use something else, something that maybe the younger ones here can relate to. Let's say you work your butt off all though highschool and get a 4.0 GPA. This opens up all sorts of opportunities that someone with a lower GPA doesn't have. Should your GPA be lowered and given to someone who only worked hard enough to get a 2.0, and you both end up with a 3.0? I ask becuase that is exactly the same thing as is being proposed by this income "sharing" idea/

 

[bgrass1234]

A sharing society is easy, and doesn't need to be done through government coercion and violence. Just get with like minded individuals, purchase a large piece of land under a common ownership among the group. Then each can build their own homes. They can all share in the means of production for food, energy and selling goods and services to others outside the group. Then all all products produced and profits from outside the group can be shared equally. All voluntary.

 

[BibleMadeMeDoIt]

Like I'm going to have an operation done by a surgeon who makes minimum wage.

Or have my baby delivered by an OB/GYN who makes 6.25 an hour.

Or get in a plane piloted by a man who makes the same amount of money as a burger flipper.

I would rather someone who enjoys their job and makes $6.25 work on me than someone who refuses to see a patient because they can only make $50 off them instead of $150 for a 15 minute exam.

 

[chaz345]

A sharing society is easy, and doesn't need to be done through government coercion and violence. Just get with like minded individuals, purchase a large piece of land under a common ownership among the group. Then each can build their own homes. They can all share in the means of production for food, energy and selling goods and services to others outside the group. Then all all products produced and profits from outside the group can be shared equally. All voluntary.

Yup. Works great on a small scale where everyone can see the effects of their hard work or of slacking off. And where there is no, or mimimal need for administration. But when it gets to a nation sized group the problems multiply to the point where it becomes unworkable. People doing physically demanding jobs look at the people administering the system and start to (correctly) see how unfair it all is.