On Wed, Oct 15, 2008 at 9:08 PM, Judah wrote: > All taxes are a redistribution of wealth. It is stupid to pretend > otherwise. But it is the price of living in a civilization. >
That is not true. If I pay taxes to build a bridge, I can drive over that bridge, so I benefit from my tax dollars. That is where tax dollars should be used- to provide resources for the common good. If I pay taxes so some slacker kid can have an extra twenty bucks to spend at the liquor store on the weekend, I don't benefit from that use at all. I'm fine with the kid getting his drink on, that's all good. I just don't feel like having him do it on my dime. > Government comes from the desire of a people to protect and enhance > itself. Establish common defense. Reduce friction between groups. > Ensure equality before the law. If it is to genuinely serve the people > that supposedly comprise it, it must serve all of them, not just some > of them. And that requires sacrifices of everyone involved. > You talk about taxes being a "disincentive to work". That is total > bullshit. Taxes are a disincentive to work, but you have to look at comparative incentives/disincentives to understand why it matters. California is a very high tax state. A lot of people move out of California to places like Florida and New Hampshire because of the tax burden in California. The issue at the Federal level is only really egregious when you levee punitive taxes on one group and not everyone. Taxing people who make an arbitrary amount of money at a higher rate than everyone else just encourages those people to find ways to dodge the system, defer their income, or simply earn less money. > You don't get to just say "it's my money" like it magically appeared > in your pocket without any influence from anything else in the world. Exactly. I am the beneficiary of a system of government and commerce envisioned by our Founding Fathers, who generally believed that the result of a man's labor should belong to him, not to the state. Of course, we pay for clean water, roads, schools, and all the other elements of the common good. So where are the limits of the common good? Should I have to pay thousands of dollars a year to a system of entitlements from which I know I will never see a nickel? Is that the common good? Sure doesn't sound like it to me. It sounds like I'm being bent over a table and screwed. A friend of mine who was fortunate to have been successful in his career just started receiving Social Security. He told me that, at current payout rates, it would take him 50 years to be paid out just on the money he paid into the system. Now granted, payout rates will rise, but if he had been able to invest that money instead of having it seized by the government, he would have substantially more money today, and he would be free to do with it as he pleased. And oh yes, the patriotism argument. Let's see how this works.According to you, I should pay until I bleed, whatever the government wants, and be thankful for the right to do so. How much should I pay? 10% more? 20% more? How much is too much? Who decides? The government? In Obama's mind, if the group of people you want to punish is small enough, that makes it OK. Alexis de Tocqueville had a name for that kind of thinking. He called it the tyranny of the majority. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Adobe® ColdFusion® 8 software 8 is the most important and dramatic release to date Get the Free Trial http://ad.doubleclick.net/clk;207172674;29440083;f Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/message.cfm/messageid:274738 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=89.70.5
