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This sounds like the gross argument that it's more efficient to tax labor because they have no recourse. The rich can move, hire lawyers, etc. to avoid taxes, s

This sounds like the gross argument that it's more efficient to tax labor because they have no recourse. The rich can move, hire lawyers, etc. to avoid taxes, so more it's efficient to focus on the hapless poor! The rebuttal is to simplify the tax code as to eliminate loopholes, such as preferential income taxation. You're right and I was mistaken that tax brackets are indexed for inflation. I'd support indexing capital gains if it eliminated their preferential taxation.

colechristensen 8y ago
>1. The higher the labor tax rate, the fewer people will work. This is what you said and is basically untrue. It is not a gross argument, we are talking about how taxation motivates people. The fact that wage income is taxed does not seem like it would make people work less. This may be different if we ever start a significant movement towards a post-scarcity economy where automation makes necessities so inexpensive that people with even a small amount of capital do not need to work. Then you might have to do strange things to incentivize people to do the few jobs that need humans.