Is taxation theft?

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sykkelmannen
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Re: Is taxation theft?

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@Lay
How do investments in public roads and highways reduce fatal accidents? (I should add that I am not exactly against roadbuilding as such. It has some benefits to human life that could be probably debated and questioned. It has many unquestionable downsides. Definitely not a good thing from a greater perspective: my opinion)
Medicare and Medicaid if anything employ thousands of people, who would otherwise look elsewhere to improve their situation. I am sure you're familiar with the notion that government likes a sick population a lot better than a healthy one. Taxpayers who die just before they reach retirement, or soon afterwards, are the best!
Jails and courts again employ thousands of people who would otherwise optimize.
Offering "protection" against a fee is a typical mafia practice, yet when a government does it nobody seems to mind. If you think governments enforce law in favour of the poor who contribute nothing to the system, think again.

Society has always been functioning. And people have always been ripped off and exploited from cradle to grave. Maybe it is indeed the only way. I am a dreamer and I reject it.
Lay Vegan wrote: Thu Jan 04, 2018 4:51 pm Paying taxes is (technically) not optional. If you refuse to pay taxes, the US government's IRS will fine you or throw you into prison. Paying taxes is a civic duty.
You didn't get my point. Paying taxes is entirely optional if you choose to ignore the racket that is the "economy" and walk away. It means an intentional liberation from most costly material things that people normally cling to. In fear of losing these things, people accept just about any tribute imposed on them. If you have nothing to lose, you have nothing to fear and no good reason to pay up. If you reduce your needs and are able to satisfy those needs thru means other than tax-burdened purchases, you are tax-free. I understand most folks have no interest in this, but it is my conviction and goal in life.
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PsYcHo
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Re: Is taxation theft?

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Wow, accidentally break my laptop and then this topic comes up. Figures.

Of course taxation is theft.

I'm going to focus on the US, since that's where I live.

200 years ago, we didn't pay income tax. But for those history buffs out there, we still had...roads!, hospitals! schools!.

I'm really surprised that on a forum based on morality, more people don't realize that forced taxation is immoral. If I don't pay my taxes, I will be fined. If I don't pay the fine and my taxes, men with guns will come to my house and force me to appear before a judge. If I still refuse to pay my taxes and fines, those men with guns will lock me in a cage against my will. If I try to fight them, they will kill me with their guns. If I try to escape the cage, they will also kill me with their guns.

What's the difference between sex and rape? Consent

I will gladly consent to pay for what services I want, but if you force me to pay for services, it is no longer consensual.

It's the equivalent of me stealing your lawn mower, then mowing your grass, and forcing you (at threat of armed force) to pay me for the service I provided you. You're Welcome!
Alcohol may have been a factor.

Taxation is theft.
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Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
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Re: Is taxation theft?

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It is weird that some people can argue that capitalism is a good system, despite the fact that under capitalism, the capitalists will profit off of the backs of the workers and not pay them the full amount that they earned, taking the majority of the money that rightfully belongs to the workers for themselves. When this is pointed out, these people claim that it is okay because the if the workers are dissatisfied, they can work somewhere else.

Yet these same people claim taxation is theft, despite the fact that if you are not happy with taxation, you can go to a different country. Obviously, saying taxation isn't theft simply because you can move country isn't a good argument, but those sorts of people are aware of that not being good argument, yet say that capitalism is great because workers can move their business somewhere else if they don't like having parasites guzzle up their money, and are oblivious to the massive contradiction here.

For the record, I am not arguing for taxation being theft or not being theft. I am simply saying that capitalism most certainly guarantees theft, and people who support capitalism but oppose taxation are hypocrites.

I am undecided on taxation. One argument for taxation is that it funds services we all use. Such as the NHS in Britain. Nye Bevan, the founder of the NHS, said that "Illness is neither an indulgence for which people have to pay, nor an offence for which they should be penalised, but a misfortune, the cost of which should be shared by the community". Taxations can guarantee this. However, the DPRK does not have any taxation yet manages to fund a socialist people-oriented system with free healthcare, free housing and free education amongst other things.

However, if taxation is in place, we must make sure that the rich who can afford it shoulder most of the burden rather than the poor.
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PsYcHo
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Re: Is taxation theft?

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Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz wrote: Thu Jan 11, 2018 2:36 pm One argument for taxation is that it funds services we all use. Such as the NHS in Britain. Nye Bevan, the founder of the NHS, said that "Illness is neither an indulgence for which people have to pay, nor an offence for which they should be penalised, but a misfortune, the cost of which should be shared by the community". Taxations can guarantee this.
This is a good point, but I would counter that if I were not burdened with sooo much forced taxation, I could (and would) donate more than I already do.

The problem with socialism/communism, is it relies on everyone to work towards the same goal with the same rewards. Not everyone is going to put out the same effort to help the cause, and the more people realize that putting forth extra effort gets you nowhere, the more people begin doing the bare minimum or less. The only way to counteract this inevitability is with the threat/use of violence, which is immoral.
Alcohol may have been a factor.

Taxation is theft.
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Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
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Re: Is taxation theft?

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PsYcHo wrote: Fri Jan 12, 2018 1:56 am sooo much forced taxation
This is true. The problem with the taxation system as it stands is that so much of what is taxed goes to wasteful senseless nonsense rather than to beneficial services we all use.

[qupte]I could (and would) donate more than I already do. [/quote]

However, this may not be true for most people.
The problem with socialism/communism, is it relies on everyone to work towards the same goal with the same rewards. Not everyone is going to put out the same effort to help the cause, and the more people realize that putting forth extra effort gets you nowhere, the more people begin doing the bare minimum or less. The only way to counteract this inevitability is with the threat/use of violence, which is immoral.
What I think you are imagining is a system in which everybody is paid the same amount no matter what they do. Such a system would be advocated by Karl Marx and the communists, but not by myself or the likeminded socialists who advocate for the workers' ownership of the means of production because such a system would be more meritocratic. From the Wikipedia article, "Marx's view of history":

Marx explained that, since socialism emerges from capitalism, it would be "stamped with its birthmarks". Economically this translates into the individual worker being awarded according to the amount of labor he contributes to society. Each worker would be given an amount of standardised credit verifying his contribution which he could then exchange for goods produced by other workers.


Marx opposed this socialism as it is "stamped with the birthmarks" of capitalism. However, this system is truly a meritocratic one and not a Utopian one such as communism where "everybody works the same, everybody earns the same".

The system of capitalism is not at all meritocratic as it allows for the exploitation of the working classes by those who own the means of production. They profit off of the workers' labour like parasites, earning money which rightfully belongs to their workers. This is explained in this cartoon:

Image
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PsYcHo
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Re: Is taxation theft?

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Your cartoon is funny (and accurate in some sense), but I actually started and ran three different businesses. I started in a minimum wage fast-food job, worked my ass off and got promoted to a decent wage, scrimped/sacrificed/and saved money to be able to start the first business. Ironically, it would have been so much cheaper to start if I didn't have to pay the government for the privilege of being allowed to sell my labor.

My latest business is on ice for now because of an unforeseen medical issue with my partner, but I had a really good plan for another business with low start up cost and high profitability (a rehash of my second business), but I can't get that off the ground because I had to pay all my savings in taxes.

The same government you want to allow to give the means of production to the workers is the same government that takes money from small business people like me and doesn't do shit to help when things go wrong.

In both of our cases, the Government is the problem. Capitalism as it exist now is corrupt for the same reason socialist/communist governments all turn corrupt.

Giving such power to so few never turns out well in the long run. The same people complaining about the 1% are perfectly fine with letting a different 1% control them (as long as they get to believe it was all their idea. The collective wins! :roll: )
Alcohol may have been a factor.

Taxation is theft.
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Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
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Re: Is taxation theft?

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PsYcHo wrote: Fri Jan 12, 2018 11:04 pm Your cartoon is funny (and accurate in some sense), but I actually started and ran three different businesses. I started in a minimum wage fast-food job, worked my ass off and got promoted to a decent wage, scrimped/sacrificed/and saved money to be able to start the first business. Ironically, it would have been so much cheaper to start if I didn't have to pay the government for the privilege of being allowed to sell my labor.

My latest business is on ice for now because of an unforeseen medical issue with my partner, but I had a really good plan for another business with low start up cost and high profitability (a rehash of my second business), but I can't get that off the ground because I had to pay all my savings in taxes.

The same government you want to allow to give the means of production to the workers is the same government that takes money from small business people like me and doesn't do shit to help when things go wrong.

In both of our cases, the Government is the problem. Capitalism as it exist now is corrupt for the same reason socialist/communist governments all turn corrupt.

Giving such power to so few never turns out well in the long run. The same people complaining about the 1% are perfectly fine with letting a different 1% control them (as long as they get to believe it was all their idea. The collective wins! :roll: )
A government as it stands in both the United States and the United Kingdom is not truly a democratic one. In both cases, the governments are not representative of their people. If they were, in the United States, you would have a democratic socialist government led by Bernie Sanders (because the "Democratic" Party wouldn't have rigged the nominations against him, and the electoral college wouldn't exist to allow Trump to become President), and in the United Kingdom, you would have a democratic socialist government led by Jeremy Corbyn (because a proportional representation system would allow the left-wing parties to form a coalition). The problem is that because the government is not democratic, it is not people-oriented, and works in the interests of capital.

Take for instance the democratic socialist government in Chile under Salvador Allende. Chile enjoyed much prosperity under his people oriented system of government. His government reduced inflation, unemployment and taxes, while increasing wages for Chilean workers, and pensions for widows, orphans and the elderly. Under his rule, Chile achieved an 8.6% growth in GDP.

However, when Allende was overthrow in a fascist CIA-backed coup, the undemocratic dictatorship government of Augusto Pinochet worked in the interests of capital and achieved nothing for ordinary Chilean people but human rights violations and misery.

The problem is not the government itself but the fact that the government as it stands is undemocratic and is in the pocket of capitalist big businesses which wish to exploit the working classes and small businesses. This is corporatism - A merger of the state and corporate power to work in the interests of capitalism. Many people like to claim that corporatism is not true capitalism. However, this is not the case. Corporatism is the only form of capitalism to actually exist, and that could feasibly work. This is because in order for capitalist parasites to survive, they need the government to be utilized as a mechanism to protect their private ownership of the means of production.

This can be seen in Spain. An Anarchist Socialist society where the means of production were collectively owned and there was no government existed in Revolutionary Catalonia. The capitalists, during this period, did not use this opportunity to set up their own Anarcho-Capitalist society. Instead, they sided with Francoist fascism during the Spanish Civil War. This shows you how capitalism exists.
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PsYcHo
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Re: Is taxation theft?

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Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz wrote: Sat Jan 13, 2018 7:28 am A government as it stands in both the United States and the United Kingdom is not truly a democratic one. In both cases, the governments are not representative of their people.
I don't think you understand my position. Democracy isn't a solution, its part of the problem. A democracy is three wolves and one sheep voting on what is for dinner. A democracy is legalized slavery. A democracy is forced taxation. Democracy is just another word for mob rule. History shows the "mob" is often immoral and erratic.

If you truly want to give the power to the people, you have to accept that some people will succeed, and some will fail. A strong person can choose to help a weaker one if they choose, but being forced to contribute to the disadvantaged isn't real freedom. And forcing people to contribute to the disadvantaged (up to the threat of violent death) doesn't make you a good person. If you think forcing people (by threat of imprisonment/death) to help others is "moral" then you don't understand the definition of morality. I'm relatively new to debating morality, but I can't comprehend how forcing anyone to do "good" is moral.
Alcohol may have been a factor.

Taxation is theft.
sykkelmannen
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Re: Is taxation theft?

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PsYcHo wrote: Sat Jan 13, 2018 8:08 pm I can't comprehend how forcing anyone to do "good" is moral.
The most painful part is that most of the taxes have nothing to do with "doing good". Agriculture subsidies, weapons, overproduction, deforestation, desertification, fueling an environmental catastrophe, ... that is what we pay for with every single taxed purchase.
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PsYcHo
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Re: Is taxation theft?

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sykkelmannen wrote: Sat Jan 13, 2018 8:28 pm
PsYcHo wrote: Sat Jan 13, 2018 8:08 pm I can't comprehend how forcing anyone to do "good" is moral.
The most painful part is that most of the taxes have nothing to do with "doing good". Agriculture subsidies, weapons, overproduction, deforestation, desertification, fueling an environmental catastrophe, ... that is what we pay for with every single taxed purchase.
That's an excellent point that I was leaving out to focus on the main point. Taxation is theft. (Glad you brought it up though, and if I haven't introduced myself, nice to meet you as well. :) )

While many taxes are initially started to "help" people or the community in general, they inevitably become used as a "free" bank account for those who wish to "improve" (as they see it) their community. The problem is once we give a small group of people power to control, they inevitably take advantage. This applies to both progressive and conservatives. The only thing they have in common (Left and Right) is they believe they have the authority to use money they steal (they did not earn any of it, they take if from those who did) to put forth the changes they see fit. The irony is those who align themselves with a side (Progressive/Conservative/Socialist/Capitalist/.. etc..) always defend their side when they are the ones in control.
Alcohol may have been a factor.

Taxation is theft.
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