Are Taxes Theft?

[UDT]

I currently work in a country where even with low pay you pay min 37% taxes. I find it ridiculous, especially looking at the current political climate, the fake democracy, and all the waste of money. 
Of course complaining about taxes is probably as old as taxes themselves. 

What do you think about it? 

How much taxes do you pay p.m.?

[Norbert Lennartz]

Must see.

[universe]

Recently read an interesting "fact" about taxes in the book "Rich Dad Poor Dad" by Robert T. Kiyosaki.

It said that taxes came from the robin hood idea of "taking from the rich and give to the poor" but are actually used to make rich people richer by only taxing the middle class.

Not sure if that is true but it sounds about right

 

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For me the tax=theft? topic can be split into two categories:

1. Who pays the taxes? The poor mostly pay consumer taxes. Middle class pays both consumer and income tax. The usual employee works 4 to 5 month a year just to pay taxes. The rich pay consumer taxes and maybe income tax. And the really rich often get away with less taxation.

I think as an employee you should be spending reasonably more on taxes the more you earn.

For companys who circumvent paying taxes I think its theft if they do so by having offshore "tax havens" and that should be forbidden. If they do it by reinvesting their profit into the business I think its fair because they help to grow the economy. 

That said there should be extra taxations, like CO2-tax and Automation-tax.

 

2. Where does the government spend the tax money?

I think its usefull to spend it on education, infrastructure, health care and so on. But I feel like many tax dollars are wasted because the government is inefficient. These "publicly owned businesses" naturally strive for survival. Maybe creating work where no work is needed and that needs to be stopped. I think the people in these jobs also die inside day after day because they do nothing or do unnecessary work. But thats just a symptom of an "uninspired" society as a whole.

Thats also why I am for a basic income.

 

Also interesting fact for most people. Because of the taxes you pay, every dollar you can save is equal to earning 1.60$! Keep that in mind when you look over your monthly expenses!

Edited June 4, 2019 by universe

[CreamCat]

You should find a tax haven.

[Shadowraix]

This is all really a language game. It depends on what theft really means to you.

Those who oppose taxes I feel like are super concerned with the individual more than the collective. Individual vs collective is a careful balance and they often take away from each other when you go one way or the other.

Taxes greatly benefit the collective. But to those who lean more individual, something like a pure capitalist anarchy society is probably seen as preferrable, unless you are poor anyway. The ones on the lower end will want collective focus to raise them up and the ones on the higher end will want individual focus to not have to raise them up.

[Norbert Lennartz]

53 minutes ago, Shadowraix said:

This is all really a language game. It depends on what theft really means to you.

If you have to steal, steal, don't talk.

Quote

Those who oppose taxes I feel like are super concerned with the individual more than the collective. Individual vs collective is a careful balance and they often take away from each other when you go one way or the other.

That's an ideological prejudice. The materialists are of course the ones who want to live on stolen money.

Quote

Taxes greatly benefit the collective. But to those who lean more individual, something like a pure capitalist anarchy society is probably seen as preferrable, unless you are poor anyway. The ones on the lower end will want collective focus to raise them up and the ones on the higher end will want individual focus to not have to raise them up.

The taxes do not benefit the collective. That is impossible. It is an expensive zero-sum game. If state would be such a great thing, as you suggest, why is state not a voluntary thing?

But in an unhindered society all productive actions are a gain for everyone. The more untaxed production can be, the more goods, the cheaper the prices.
To take a look at the poor, on the other hand, is a mockery of 800 million undernourished people in the world.

[Rilles]

lmao taxes are not theft, stop watching stefan molyneux

[Norbert Lennartz]

Of course, taxes are robbery. It takes a world view, a firmly burnt-in self-image, to negate this.
It is pure, acquired fear and ignorance. The fear that something important would be missing without a nanny state.

[Knock]

I see taxes are repayments for all the abundance and opportunities we are have in the modern world. I am so thankful for all the contributions of those citizens in years before me in enabling me to have such a comfortable and safe life. 

I owe my life to public funded goods. I had a near life threatening situation, so I caught a public train to see a public surgeon. I was then able to buy publicly subsidised medicine while I recovered, all the while being supported by the government on a study allowance while I attended university on an interest free loan.

To claim taxation as theft wouldn't be anything less than pure self-entitlement. 

[Norbert Lennartz]

@Knock

You're thanking the Mafia.
That is so sick.
 

[Shaun]

Yes, total theft.

[Aeris]

2 hours ago, Knock said:

I see taxes are repayments for all the abundance and opportunities we are have in the modern world. I am so thankful for all the contributions of those citizens in years before me in enabling me to have such a comfortable and safe life. 

I owe my life to public funded goods. I had a near life threatening situation, so I caught a public train to see a public surgeon. I was then able to buy publicly subsidised medicine while I recovered, all the while being supported by the government on a study allowance while I attended university on an interest free loan.

To claim taxation as theft wouldn't be anything less than pure self-entitlement. 

Do you think of others or just for your own safety ?

As long as someone on earth suffer. everyone will suffer one way or another. 

I Always tend to get fun from the perspective that society 'has given all the goods' the cup is full in those eyes.

For me It's conveniant.

Society rob us of fundamental things aswell.

Like how do I can be living from hunt and fishing ? I can't current society stole earth and poisoned the fish.

What about improving things ?

Ho no society is good.

No society is FOS. There is goods' sure joyfully.

But this doesn't mean It's not based upon old stack of shit and should be rethinked.

Society is a cage without fence.

But it is what it is

 

 

 

[Shadowraix]

4 hours ago, Norbert Lennartz said:

That's an ideological prejudice. The materialists are of course the ones who want to live on stolen money.

Its just a hunch. When you are concerned with your own survival, taxes will either hurt or help you. People will be against when it hurts, and for it when it helps.

4 hours ago, Norbert Lennartz said:

The taxes do not benefit the collective. That is impossible. It is an expensive zero-sum game. If state would be such a great thing, as you suggest, why is state not a voluntary thing?

But in an unhindered society all productive actions are a gain for everyone. The more untaxed production can be, the more goods, the cheaper the prices.
To take a look at the poor, on the other hand, is a mockery of 800 million undernourished people in the world.

It does benefit the collective. By distributing the cost of a service among everybody proportional to what you make, it makes the hit as minimal as possible on everybody. Those who can't afford the service get access to it. Those who contribute but don't use it, means it can go to others who need it. Its very clear here how the collective benefits but it can hurt the individual especially when you don't use the service. An individual based approach would mean nobody is paying for somebody else, but that everybody carries their own weight. A collective approach means we carry our weight together. Even if some can't.

Yes untaxed production may be cheaper, but it would mean you would lose access to the services the taxes are funding, so those services would lose money, causing their prices to go up. And I don't think this would be a proportional 1:1 ratio. 

Edited June 4, 2019 by Shadowraix

[Norbert Lennartz]

@Shadowraix

It's not worth commenting on. First do your homework and learn economics of the Austrian School.
But you don't want that. Trollery.

[integral]

The majority of the wealth the government collects from taxes are inefficiently spent do to corruption or general uninsightful low level thinking, mostly tage blue/orange thinking (if lucky) .

If the taxes where spent intelligently only for the greater good, all transparent then 40%-50% taxes is useful and necessary to maintain/grow society.

But this isnt the case, right now its as good as robbery for a large portion of the tax maybe 20% of that 37%.

-

The next big leap in government will come with a liquid democracy. Where people can vote on individual issues on there phone and delegate there vote to people they trust.

Merging technology with government, giving the people back there power. Abolishing politicians, presidents, lobeing and parties. 

Pretty exiting stuff... 

[Shadowraix]

2 hours ago, Norbert Lennartz said:

@Shadowraix

It's not worth commenting on. First do your homework and learn economics of the Austrian School.
But you don't want that. Trollery.

You reply to everybody else on this stuff, but not me? What a shame. I'm happy to admit I'm no expert. 

Im just stating what I see. That taxes help those who can't afford a service and hurts those that can afford a service. When efficiently used anyway. Are you saying that we could still have things like Healthcare and education and it be affordable for everyone with no government funding to either of them? Who's going to fund it these expensive operations poor people can't pay for? Collective thinking would be to not allow these people to go without such necessary services. 

Edited June 4, 2019 by Shadowraix

[CreamCat]

26 minutes ago, Shiva said:

You know, I would love to pay 1 million in taxes

If you had to pay 90% of your income in taxes, you would change your mind.

[Apparition of Jack]

Taxes are utterly necessary if you enjoy not being stabbed for whatever modicum of food you have in your house. Every single human lives within a collective (with ever-changing and complex needs,) and it is the responsibility of each individual to ensure that collective is healthy and functioning, less it fall into violence, hatred and anarchy. Taxes are one of the most straight-forward, efficient and responsible ways to reach that end.

It's not taxes you should be afraid of, it's the people who tell you you don't need them.

Edited June 4, 2019 by Apparation of Jack

[Norbert Lennartz]

This etatist discussion of tanks, liars, Marxists, ignorants, preachers, ideologues has the quality of the Greta Thunberg Hype, only another topic.

[Rilles]

2 minutes ago, Norbert Lennartz said:

This etatist discussion of tanks, liars, Marxists, ignorants, preachers, ideologues has the quality of the Greta Thunberg Hype, only another topic.

Youre lost in your concepts, dude.