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There is no moral obligation to pay additional taxes beyond the minimum that tax law permits.
by totalZero 9y ago
There is no moral obligation to pay additional taxes beyond the minimum that tax law permits.
- throwaway2048 9y agoaccording to you, do you have the same outlook on people exploiting bugs/backdoors in code on other peoples machines for personal gain?
- natecavanaugh 9y agoPersonally, I would say, no, not the same outlook, unless you treat any system where an advantage is gained by one actor over another. But I don't think we can equivocate the action of not only breaking into a system (weak or not) and stealing something from others, from the government (or any actor) leaving money on the table due to their inefficiencies, or lack of foresight. But if we're going for false equivalencies, you could also say that government's using the act of force to take money is also equally wrong, which is the typical libertarian argument. I'm not a big fan of either argument, as they all fall apart as soon as you get into the details.
- totalZero 9y agoMaybe there is a more applicable analogy that doesn't invoke "other people." After all, Google isn't exploiting a loophole of Amazon or Apple, nor is it violating any terms of service; it's simply complying with tax law.
- Analemma_ 9y agoThis mindset seems fine in isolation, but it falls apart when you consider that corporations and the wealthy first subvert democracy to pass tax law with loopholes only they can use, and then use this aphorism as a gag order to keep the rest of us from complaining about it.
- totalZero 9y agoPotentially, but the question then becomes (A) did Google have a hand in passing this tax law, and (B) does this so-called gag order extend to complaining about the tax law itself, or only to compliance with said law? I see no evidence of (A), and if my comment has been construed as an aphoristic gag order, I would like to answer (B) by clarifying that it only means there's not much to complain about when a company abides by the tax regulation.
- jstanley 9y agoI think you mean there is no legal obligation to pay additional taxes beyond the minimum that tax law permits. Whether your moral obligation lies above or below the legal minimum depends on your viewpoint.
- kinkrtyavimoodh 9y agoDoes this logic also applies to individuals who look for various kinds of tax exemptions in their personal filings? Is someone taking a mortgage exemption being immoral?
- jstanley 9y agoCareful. I wasn't arguing that corporations minimising their tax burden is immoral. I was arguing that a moral obligation is orthogonal to a legal obligation, and may be either higher or lower, depending on your viewpoint. My opinion is that moral tax obligations are so far below legal obligations that almost any effort to minimise taxes is perfectly fine. But you still have to pay your legal minimum if you don't want to go to prison.
- kinkrtyavimoodh 9y agoYes, but when someone's calling Google evil for this behavior, it's clear they consider this act immoral. And I am asking whether similar logic extends to individuals too.
- jstanley 9y agoI don't know, you'd have to ask those people. I don't personally think it's evil for either Google or an individual.
- totalZero 9y agoYour thought is incorrect. I mean precisely what I said. There is no moral obligation to pay more than your legally required amount of tax. The presumption would be that no moral obligation exists until one is proven, for precisely the reason you mentioned (it depends on your viewpoint, so we cannot begin with any one set of norms), so if you would kindly propose one, I will disprove it.