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I take pride in paying my taxes. It reminds me that our society has a cost, and we all contribute towards it. I’d be interested to know how others feel. And ho

I take pride in paying my taxes. It reminds me that our society has a cost, and we all contribute towards it. I’d be interested to know how others feel. And how we could inspire more people to feel pride in contributing rather than make such efforts to avoid contributing.

andyburke 8y ago
I'm with you. But many people do not agree with us, and the last I heard, the ROI on each dollar spent at the IRS is higher than almost anywhere else in government. Hollowing out the IRS, and by extension the federal budget, has been a goal of one of our political parties for a very long time. It's sad to see them succeeding in a way that will cost our country dearly in the long term.
- InitialLastName 8y ago
  It's almost as if the person running that party has spent his entire adult life trying to find ways to defraud the IRS (and otherwise minimize his tax burden).
- nybble41 8y ago
  > the ROI on each dollar spent at the IRS is higher than almost anywhere else in government It only looks that way because you're comparing the revenues and expenses of a profit center. This is like measuring the "ROI" of a company's invoicing department, while disregarding the fact that without the cost centers actually producing goods and services for sale there would be nothing to invoice. Properly measuring the worth of the department requires looking at the whole system, not just the IRS—and in this case, that includes both the public and private sectors. After all, the government supposedly exists to serve the public, and not for its own benefit. From that point of view, the IRS isn't producing much of anything; it's just moving money from one area of the economy to another. Any argument that this activity results in a positive ROI hinges on whether the areas they're moving money to are more beneficial than the areas they're taking money from. (Many would disagree.)
AlexTWithBeard 8y ago
I have strongly mixed feelings, especially with 60% of federal taxes going to military spending. National parks are good though.
- leetcrew 8y ago
  can you cite a source for 60% of federal taxes going to military spending?
  - AlexTWithBeard 8y ago
    The first link on google: https://www.nationalpriorities.org/budget-basics/federal-budget-101/spending/ https://www.nationalpriorities.org/budget-basics/federal-bud... claims 54% on "military" and additional 6% on "veteran's affair"
    - onlyrealcuzzo 8y ago
      That's not accounting for payroll taxes like Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid -- right? Because those, combined with debt service, make up a HUGE portion of the federal budget.
    - leetcrew 8y ago
      yeah that is out of the discretionary budget, which is roughly a fourth of the total budget. the government also spends more money than it collects in taxes, so the 60% figure doesn't have much to do with what fraction of your tax dollars actually get spent on the military.
  - yarosv 8y ago
    ~54% according to the breakdown on wiki[0] [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2018_United_States_federal_budget https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2018_United_States_federal_bud...
    - yarosv 8y ago
      As noted above and below, this is not full budget. Please ignore this comment.
malvosenior 8y ago
I will never feel good (let alone pride) paying taxes until: * I don't pay an exorbitant amount of my monthly income to health insurance, mostly due to government meddling in that industry. * Billions of dollars of weapons aren't deployed in theaters I don't want to fund wars in. * I see some sort of efficiency or really, non-corruption at the local and state level with the money I'm paying. Until then, I will continue to feel exploited and that my money would be of better use in the private sector.
- bhawks 8y ago
  With the ways the government (local->state->federal) spend money and manage budgets funding them (thru debt+taxes) at the absolute minimum is the only moral option. Rationale being: * Military industrial complex and associated adventurism * Broken criminal Justice system, prison industrial complex and civil asset forfeitures. * Drug war * Chronic pension mismanagement in nearly all states and localities. Could go on and on ...
- mindslight 8y ago
  Don't forget the outright citizen-hostile domestic programs - NSA, DEA, CIA, DHS, TSA, etc. They're not an overwhelming portion of the budget, but taxes are the source of energy that they live on. Very few would directly pay to be surveilled and terrorized, but through the magic of the principle-agent problem the parasites persist. (Having said that, I doubt the motives of large scale tax avoiders are so noble - in fact I would guess that they'd be more likely to support said programs)
exabrial 8y ago
I'm against taxes for the simple fact they're non-voluntary. I don't think there's anything wrong with people that that are willing to pay them, but I don't think forcefully [meaning, eventually you will be arrested by someone with a gun] taking another person's money is justifiable by any society.
- TheBeardKing 8y ago
  I would like to agree with you, except that if I were completely honest I would sometimes lump it with things that I should pay for like NPR and Wikipedia, and which I normally do, but some years I skip out on to spend on other niceties. Keeping government running and infrastructure maintained is much more important and should not be voluntarily withheld.
- rm_-rf_slash 8y ago
  I too read Atlas Shrugged as a teenager.
- a_c_s 8y ago
  In the USA one won't be arrested nor go to jail for simply not paying taxes as it is merely a civil offense, not a criminal one. https://tax.findlaw.com/tax-problems-audits/can-you-go-to-jail-for-not-paying-taxes.html https://tax.findlaw.com/tax-problems-audits/can-you-go-to-ja...
  - rmidthun 8y ago
    I think you need to read that linked article a bit more closely. "You can go to jail for not filing your taxes. You can go to jail for lying on your return. But you can’t go to jail for not having enough money to pay your taxes. " That is, if you intentionally avoid paying taxes by either not filing or filing a fraudulent report, then you certain can go to jail. See Al Capone for the most famous example.
- toasterlovin 8y ago
  Would love to know how you think emergency response or national defense would work in a taxes-are-voluntary scenario.
StevePerkins 8y ago
Governance matters. My feelings are similar to yours when it comes to paying my LOCAL taxes (e.g. property and sales). Because: (1) I care about the services that my local government provides (e.g. schools, parks, libraries, roads and infrastructure), and (2) My local county happens to do a good job at providing those services. On the contrary, I view the FEDERAL government as a complete and utter mess. Spending all of my contributions (as well as those borrowed from my grandkids) on grotesquely inefficient entitlement programs, an imperial military, and basically just bribing corrupt government officials so that anything can get passed at all. I feel no moral qualms whatever with avoiding those taxes to the extent legally possible.
- mullingitover 8y ago
  You know your local infrastructure would collapse or become breathtakingly costly if it wasn't propped up by Federal funds, right?
  - nicwolff 8y ago
    I live in New York; we remit something like $50B/year more to the Federal government than we receive. I paid about $650K to the Feds last year, and while I don't begrudge the shared responsibility, it's hard not to feel like a prime sucker sending so much to a government that will to allocate it mostly to states whose inhabitants voted for a President who would agree that I was foolish to have been so honest.
    - deleted 8y ago
      [deleted]
    - fwip 8y ago
      Forgive me for not feeling sorry for somebody pulling in 7 figures a year.
    - burfog 8y ago
      Like you, the President has a place in New York and he lived there until he became eligible for government housing in DC. I think you have his sympathy on the taxes. There was that one year that he paid for an F-15 with all the extras.
dec0dedab0de 8y ago
I just don't like filling out the paperwork. It is like torture every year. I also dont particularly like the government keeping track of where everyone works.
- pstuart 8y ago
  Bear in mind that anti-tax groups, and other profiteers of inefficiency (Grover Norquist, Intuit, et. al) actively lobby to make paying taxes as painful as possible so you will hate paying taxes period. https://www.propublica.org/article/how-the-maker-of-turbotax-fought-free-simple-tax-filing https://www.propublica.org/article/how-the-maker-of-turbotax...
  - bhawks 8y ago
    Also bare in mind that it's not an accident that April 15 is approximately 6 months away from general elections in November (basically couldn't be further away). Politicians' campaigns would have a different spin if folks had just recently filed their taxes.
  - acheron 8y ago
    Hardly. If taxes were "as painful as possible" we wouldn't have automatic withholding. Right now almost everyone pays via automatic withholding so they never see the money in the first place, and the defaults are set so most people get a small refund. If you want to see "painful as possible", make people write a check for the full amount every April.
    - pstuart 8y ago
      Grover Norquist's own words: "That’s the real reason the Left and the government class supports IRS-prepared tax returns: they want the government to be bigger, and that requires higher tax revenues. The fact that IRS tax preparation is understood by everyone to result in higher tax revenues exposes the conflict of interest that would be caused by IRS-prepared tax returns." From https://www.huffingtonpost.com/grover-norquist/grover-norquist-taxes_b_3005698.html https://www.huffingtonpost.com/grover-norquist/grover-norqui... That argument is disingenuous at best.
sonnyblarney 8y ago
I take pride in efficient services provided by taxation, and have extreme contempt for arbitrary taxation to support those that are inefficient, sometimes arrogantly so. In Toronto, the folks that collect change at the TTC (i.e Metro) stations, earn over $100K a year if they work over time. On my last visit - I had to stand in line for 20 minutes merely to buy a token with change. There were no change machines and no means for me to use even a debit/credit card. The 'pass' that they offer (i.e. you load it up, more for commuters) cannot even be bought by the people selling tokens. It's absurd and outrageous. Granted there is some overlap of systems going on as they move to the new pass system - it's still stupendously insulting.
twblalock 8y ago
> I take pride in paying my taxes. It reminds me that our society has a cost, and we all contribute towards it. Society's cost needs to be constrained by taxpayers. We need to put pressure on our governments to spend our tax dollars efficiently. I live in California, so I pay state income tax as well as Federal income tax. I don't think I get as much per dollar of my tax as someone in Europe does. Europeans pay a little bit more than me (yes, only a little bit, I did the math) and get a lot more from their government, including comprehensive public transit that makes transit in the USA look like a joke, a much better social safety net, comprehensive health care not tied to their employers, schools that are actually good, low-cost higher education, etc. People in the UK get more from their government under Tory austerity policies than Americans ever got. I don't want to pay more taxes until I get more for each dollar. If the Europeans can do it, so can we, but the political will does not exist here.
- guelo 8y ago
  Your tax dollars pay for a lot more military than the Europeans do.
  - twblalock 8y ago
    Yeah, but that's an efficiency problem, both in the sense that the Department of Defense is not efficient with money and that we have more military than we need.
    - jki275 8y ago
      And a significant portion of the DOD's budget is spent protecting other countries, many of them even in Europe.
  - Varcht 8y ago
    Our tax dollars pay for more of their military than they do...
    - iscrewyou 8y ago
TallGuyShort 8y ago
All the things I think are worth taxing for constantly seem to be underfunded. We seem to have plenty of money for the things I think are wrong. If you're the government, you can always spend the money on stuff you want but your constituents don't want, and then tell them you have to raise taxes to pay for the things they want.
matz1 8y ago
Good for you. I definitely support and encourage you and I will get the benefit too. That being said, will I happily pay my tax? Haha no. I would not hesitate to cheat if the risk is very low.
ip26 8y ago
I don't terribly mind paying taxes. But I figure following the model of capitalism, it's meant for everyone to act in their own interest & look for the lowest tax bill, and that's how you arrive at what your fair share of taxes are. For example, finding all the deductions you are legally entitled to, or choosing to buy an electric car because it reduces your tax bill. That's all behavior we want. So I guess you could say I'm happy to pay my fair share- but not more. Now, structuring everything such that a particular taxpayer's lowest tax bill is actually "fair", is not easy, especially with lobbyists in the equation.
oppositelock 8y ago
I pay my taxes because I'd be in jail if I didn't. So much of what I pay goes to killing people all over the world, spreading the US hegemony, and jailing people for victimless "crimes" which I personally consider to be non-issues, that I'm disgusted each year when I tabulate my taxes. So, you feel pride, I feel disgust. Society does have a cost, but building shared infrastructure and whatnot doesn't have to be funded via just one mechanism, one which can do whatever it feels like all over the world.
- dwaltrip 8y ago
  Which government would you rather give your tax money to?
  - BLKNSLVR 8y ago
    Don't use the excuse that your government couldn't do better just because others are worse. That ends up being the race to the bottom that we're currently witnessing.
    - dwaltrip 8y ago
      I didn't mean to justify the status quo, merely to point out the difficulties. We should absolutely work to improve things. But we shouldn't do so blindly.
akudha 8y ago
I'm a foreigner in the US and am thankful for the public infrastructure (even the old ones) and more than happy to pay taxes. I find a lot of Americans complain about taxes (even those who are on welfare, forgetting that taxes paid by others is what helping them in the first place). I went to my local library to become a member. The old lady there asked me if I live in the area and launched a lecture (even after I showed address proof) about how she is paying her taxes and she wants to make sure her "tax dollars" are used only by those in the area etc. The whole thing was bizarre. What is interesting is that taxes in US are actually lower than many European countries. Sure, the federal gov isn't the most efficient one, but hating taxes THIS much just feels weird and wrong to me. Without taxes, civilization as we know will collapse
- smsm42 8y ago
  Your local library most likely is supported by local property taxes, not federal income taxes. Though there are federal grants available for specific library improvements sometimes.
- jki275 8y ago
  The US was founded in a tax revolt. It all makes sense if you think about it a bit.
smsm42 8y ago
I fail to find any pride in being forced to pay the price I have no influence over for goods I have no say in either production or distribution. Yes, I know that that's what I signed for when moving into the US to live as a non-citizen alien (not that becoming a citizen would change anything - voting in California, esp. SV part, is next to useless, the outcomes are predetermined anyway), and it's probably a better deal than most of other countries would offer me (that's why I took it), but it doesn't make me bubbling with joy. I recognize that there's probably no realistic way to avoid it, but as it is for a person having to take drugs due to chronic illness, recognizing the necessity of having to do something does not mean being happy or proud about it. It's just a part of harsh reality. Especially if you take interest in particular details of how the massive trillion-size budgets are spent and how much money is wasted or stolen (illegally or legally) from it. No, platitudes of "society has a cost" do not do much for me. Food has a cost too, but if I'm offered a McDonald's sandwich for $100, I may pay for it and eat it, if all other food around is worse and more expensive, but I won't be proud or happy about it. And would take any legal effort available to me to keep my money out of the taxman's reach. When I feel the need to contribute to some cause, I just open my favorite charities list (unfortunately, much longer than my budget - after taxes - affords me to support adequately) and donate there.
oTTjRQxkTz 8y ago
I don't take pride at all. It is burdensome, worrying, and hostile for the following reasons. 1) My taxes are overly complicated. I have to hire lawyers and accountants to help. They have made mistakes but I am still liable. 2) My tax bracket pays a very high rate. With state taxes included I am near 50% on income. I don't think that's reasonable and the justification, in my opinion, is more based on a suspicion or dislike of people in my bracket than because I can afford to pay. The government spends far more than it's revenue anyways. If my bracket were moved to 100%, there would still be revenue deficits. 3) The IRS treats me as if I am hiding money. The higher your bracket it seems the more likely you are to be audited. My father has been audited multiple times. I have been audited once. It is not a pleasant experience and every letter the IRS sends causes more anxiety. Honest or trivial mistakes are treated as if done with criminal intent. 4) Nearly half the population does not pay taxes but can elect people who can choose what my rates are. I will never have a majority representation or much power to lower them. This doesn't seem fair to me. 5) The IRS can very well be incompetent or corrupt in the sense of being political but no one will admit that. The assumption is generally that tax cheats are a problem but not a biased IRS. For me to be proud, I think lowering my rate, simplifying taxes, requiring more Americans to pay, even if it is just a few dollars, and putting something in place to report overzealous IRS agents or corruption there would go a long way.
- beatgammit 8y ago
  I agree with most of what you said, but it seems silly to have everyone pay into taxes when they're net receivers of benefits. The more important thing IMO is that the government is not careful with the money we give it, and it supports causes the majority disagree with (e.g. upholding the federal marijuana ban). When you couple runaway spending with a feeling of lack of representation, paying taxes feels more like extortion than "paying your share". If having everyone pay a little in taxes means they're more likely to vote for responsible spending, I'm all for it. But the tax system is so convoluted that many people think they're making money with their refund. Maybe having few people get a refund would be better, IDK. But the current system makes people apathetic toward federal spending.
  - 8y ago
conanbatt 8y ago
The people that direct how taxes are spent have campaigned for a century to make people feel good about paying them. The truth is revealed when someone refuses to pay, and suddently the prideful contributions become mandatory commandments, under threats of confiscation and ultimately restriction of freedom.
zamalek 8y ago
I was raised a Catholic and, while not everything stuck with me, "give to Ceasar what is Ceasar's" did. The work that taxes do, at least in WA, make it a fair bargain too (where in South Africa it was daylight robbery).
isoskeles 8y ago
I take no pride in it. I had terrible experiences with the public school system growing up, and I doubt it's been fixed since then. I do not trust the government to do the right thing as a result. The government is yet another organization made up of people (or really, smaller organizations made up of people) who aren't necessarily doing their job correctly (or incorrectly, to be fair). Also, our "society" and the government are not the same thing. Paying taxes to the government is not the same thing as paying your dues to society. As an example, if I have to pick between which person "contributes" to "society" more, a person who pays $0 in taxes because they work but earn very little versus a person who pays $0 in taxes because all their income is made illegally through theft, I can easily point to the former as being a better contributor to society. Similarly, one could make a case against the contributions of someone who pays a lot in taxes because they own a business that harms the environment or has other negative externalities. The point is that taxes are a rather poor measure of contribution to society. It's simply a reward of resources to government which, at least in the US, transforms those resources into a lot of shit including death in other countries. I will admit that I think this is all necessary in order for the whole system to work, but I'm not going to pretend that the government is good or even, simply, not as bad as corporations. The attitude that taxes are something to be prideful about just seems like cheerleading. Not making a personal dig at you, that's just how I feel about the attitude. And personally, I'll probably never feel prideful in contributing to taxes. Or maybe when I start receiving social security in several decades. Basically, it would take a lot to convince me that my previous most significant experience with the government (through my education) is unimportant and these other reasons (A, B, C, etc.) over here -- that I've had no personal experience with -- show that government is actually really very good and I should be proud to pay taxes.
- InitialLastName 8y ago
  > Similarly, one could make a case against the contributions of someone who pays a lot in taxes because they own a business that harms the environment or has other negative externalities. I think there's a strong case to be made that one of the most fundamental justifications for taxes is to cover the cost of negative externalities.

andyburke 8y ago

I'm with you. But many people do not agree with us, and the last I heard, the ROI on each dollar spent at the IRS is higher than almost anywhere else in government. Hollowing out the IRS, and by extension the federal budget, has been a goal of one of our political parties for a very long time. It's sad to see them succeeding in a way that will cost our country dearly in the long term.

InitialLastName 8y ago
It's almost as if the person running that party has spent his entire adult life trying to find ways to defraud the IRS (and otherwise minimize his tax burden).
nybble41 8y ago
> the ROI on each dollar spent at the IRS is higher than almost anywhere else in government It only looks that way because you're comparing the revenues and expenses of a profit center. This is like measuring the "ROI" of a company's invoicing department, while disregarding the fact that without the cost centers actually producing goods and services for sale there would be nothing to invoice. Properly measuring the worth of the department requires looking at the whole system, not just the IRS—and in this case, that includes both the public and private sectors. After all, the government supposedly exists to serve the public, and not for its own benefit. From that point of view, the IRS isn't producing much of anything; it's just moving money from one area of the economy to another. Any argument that this activity results in a positive ROI hinges on whether the areas they're moving money to are more beneficial than the areas they're taking money from. (Many would disagree.)

AlexTWithBeard 8y ago

I have strongly mixed feelings, especially with 60% of federal taxes going to military spending. National parks are good though.

leetcrew 8y ago
can you cite a source for 60% of federal taxes going to military spending?
- AlexTWithBeard 8y ago
  The first link on google: https://www.nationalpriorities.org/budget-basics/federal-budget-101/spending/ https://www.nationalpriorities.org/budget-basics/federal-bud... claims 54% on "military" and additional 6% on "veteran's affair"
  - onlyrealcuzzo 8y ago
    That's not accounting for payroll taxes like Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid -- right? Because those, combined with debt service, make up a HUGE portion of the federal budget.
  - leetcrew 8y ago
    yeah that is out of the discretionary budget, which is roughly a fourth of the total budget. the government also spends more money than it collects in taxes, so the 60% figure doesn't have much to do with what fraction of your tax dollars actually get spent on the military.
- yarosv 8y ago
  ~54% according to the breakdown on wiki[0] [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2018_United_States_federal_budget https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2018_United_States_federal_bud...
  - yarosv 8y ago
    As noted above and below, this is not full budget. Please ignore this comment.

malvosenior 8y ago

I will never feel good (let alone pride) paying taxes until: * I don't pay an exorbitant amount of my monthly income to health insurance, mostly due to government meddling in that industry. * Billions of dollars of weapons aren't deployed in theaters I don't want to fund wars in. * I see some sort of efficiency or really, non-corruption at the local and state level with the money I'm paying. Until then, I will continue to feel exploited and that my money would be of better use in the private sector.

bhawks 8y ago
With the ways the government (local->state->federal) spend money and manage budgets funding them (thru debt+taxes) at the absolute minimum is the only moral option. Rationale being: * Military industrial complex and associated adventurism * Broken criminal Justice system, prison industrial complex and civil asset forfeitures. * Drug war * Chronic pension mismanagement in nearly all states and localities. Could go on and on ...
mindslight 8y ago
Don't forget the outright citizen-hostile domestic programs - NSA, DEA, CIA, DHS, TSA, etc. They're not an overwhelming portion of the budget, but taxes are the source of energy that they live on. Very few would directly pay to be surveilled and terrorized, but through the magic of the principle-agent problem the parasites persist. (Having said that, I doubt the motives of large scale tax avoiders are so noble - in fact I would guess that they'd be more likely to support said programs)

exabrial 8y ago

I'm against taxes for the simple fact they're non-voluntary. I don't think there's anything wrong with people that that are willing to pay them, but I don't think forcefully [meaning, eventually you will be arrested by someone with a gun] taking another person's money is justifiable by any society.

TheBeardKing 8y ago
I would like to agree with you, except that if I were completely honest I would sometimes lump it with things that I should pay for like NPR and Wikipedia, and which I normally do, but some years I skip out on to spend on other niceties. Keeping government running and infrastructure maintained is much more important and should not be voluntarily withheld.
rm_-rf_slash 8y ago
I too read Atlas Shrugged as a teenager.
a_c_s 8y ago
In the USA one won't be arrested nor go to jail for simply not paying taxes as it is merely a civil offense, not a criminal one. https://tax.findlaw.com/tax-problems-audits/can-you-go-to-jail-for-not-paying-taxes.html https://tax.findlaw.com/tax-problems-audits/can-you-go-to-ja...
- rmidthun 8y ago
  I think you need to read that linked article a bit more closely. "You can go to jail for not filing your taxes. You can go to jail for lying on your return. But you can’t go to jail for not having enough money to pay your taxes. " That is, if you intentionally avoid paying taxes by either not filing or filing a fraudulent report, then you certain can go to jail. See Al Capone for the most famous example.
toasterlovin 8y ago
Would love to know how you think emergency response or national defense would work in a taxes-are-voluntary scenario.

StevePerkins 8y ago

Governance matters. My feelings are similar to yours when it comes to paying my LOCAL taxes (e.g. property and sales). Because: (1) I care about the services that my local government provides (e.g. schools, parks, libraries, roads and infrastructure), and (2) My local county happens to do a good job at providing those services. On the contrary, I view the FEDERAL government as a complete and utter mess. Spending all of my contributions (as well as those borrowed from my grandkids) on grotesquely inefficient entitlement programs, an imperial military, and basically just bribing corrupt government officials so that anything can get passed at all. I feel no moral qualms whatever with avoiding those taxes to the extent legally possible.

mullingitover 8y ago
You know your local infrastructure would collapse or become breathtakingly costly if it wasn't propped up by Federal funds, right?
- nicwolff 8y ago
  I live in New York; we remit something like $50B/year more to the Federal government than we receive. I paid about $650K to the Feds last year, and while I don't begrudge the shared responsibility, it's hard not to feel like a prime sucker sending so much to a government that will to allocate it mostly to states whose inhabitants voted for a President who would agree that I was foolish to have been so honest.
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
  - fwip 8y ago
    Forgive me for not feeling sorry for somebody pulling in 7 figures a year.
  - burfog 8y ago
    Like you, the President has a place in New York and he lived there until he became eligible for government housing in DC. I think you have his sympathy on the taxes. There was that one year that he paid for an F-15 with all the extras.

dec0dedab0de 8y ago

I just don't like filling out the paperwork. It is like torture every year. I also dont particularly like the government keeping track of where everyone works.

pstuart 8y ago
Bear in mind that anti-tax groups, and other profiteers of inefficiency (Grover Norquist, Intuit, et. al) actively lobby to make paying taxes as painful as possible so you will hate paying taxes period. https://www.propublica.org/article/how-the-maker-of-turbotax-fought-free-simple-tax-filing https://www.propublica.org/article/how-the-maker-of-turbotax...
- bhawks 8y ago
  Also bare in mind that it's not an accident that April 15 is approximately 6 months away from general elections in November (basically couldn't be further away). Politicians' campaigns would have a different spin if folks had just recently filed their taxes.
- acheron 8y ago
  Hardly. If taxes were "as painful as possible" we wouldn't have automatic withholding. Right now almost everyone pays via automatic withholding so they never see the money in the first place, and the defaults are set so most people get a small refund. If you want to see "painful as possible", make people write a check for the full amount every April.
  - pstuart 8y ago
    Grover Norquist's own words: "That’s the real reason the Left and the government class supports IRS-prepared tax returns: they want the government to be bigger, and that requires higher tax revenues. The fact that IRS tax preparation is understood by everyone to result in higher tax revenues exposes the conflict of interest that would be caused by IRS-prepared tax returns." From https://www.huffingtonpost.com/grover-norquist/grover-norquist-taxes_b_3005698.html https://www.huffingtonpost.com/grover-norquist/grover-norqui... That argument is disingenuous at best.

sonnyblarney 8y ago

I take pride in efficient services provided by taxation, and have extreme contempt for arbitrary taxation to support those that are inefficient, sometimes arrogantly so. In Toronto, the folks that collect change at the TTC (i.e Metro) stations, earn over $100K a year if they work over time. On my last visit - I had to stand in line for 20 minutes merely to buy a token with change. There were no change machines and no means for me to use even a debit/credit card. The 'pass' that they offer (i.e. you load it up, more for commuters) cannot even be bought by the people selling tokens. It's absurd and outrageous. Granted there is some overlap of systems going on as they move to the new pass system - it's still stupendously insulting.

twblalock 8y ago

> I take pride in paying my taxes. It reminds me that our society has a cost, and we all contribute towards it. Society's cost needs to be constrained by taxpayers. We need to put pressure on our governments to spend our tax dollars efficiently. I live in California, so I pay state income tax as well as Federal income tax. I don't think I get as much per dollar of my tax as someone in Europe does. Europeans pay a little bit more than me (yes, only a little bit, I did the math) and get a lot more from their government, including comprehensive public transit that makes transit in the USA look like a joke, a much better social safety net, comprehensive health care not tied to their employers, schools that are actually good, low-cost higher education, etc. People in the UK get more from their government under Tory austerity policies than Americans ever got. I don't want to pay more taxes until I get more for each dollar. If the Europeans can do it, so can we, but the political will does not exist here.

guelo 8y ago
Your tax dollars pay for a lot more military than the Europeans do.
- twblalock 8y ago
  Yeah, but that's an efficiency problem, both in the sense that the Department of Defense is not efficient with money and that we have more military than we need.
  - jki275 8y ago
    And a significant portion of the DOD's budget is spent protecting other countries, many of them even in Europe.
- Varcht 8y ago
  Our tax dollars pay for more of their military than they do...
  - iscrewyou 8y ago

TallGuyShort 8y ago

All the things I think are worth taxing for constantly seem to be underfunded. We seem to have plenty of money for the things I think are wrong. If you're the government, you can always spend the money on stuff you want but your constituents don't want, and then tell them you have to raise taxes to pay for the things they want.

matz1 8y ago

Good for you. I definitely support and encourage you and I will get the benefit too. That being said, will I happily pay my tax? Haha no. I would not hesitate to cheat if the risk is very low.

ip26 8y ago

I don't terribly mind paying taxes. But I figure following the model of capitalism, it's meant for everyone to act in their own interest & look for the lowest tax bill, and that's how you arrive at what your fair share of taxes are. For example, finding all the deductions you are legally entitled to, or choosing to buy an electric car because it reduces your tax bill. That's all behavior we want. So I guess you could say I'm happy to pay my fair share- but not more. Now, structuring everything such that a particular taxpayer's lowest tax bill is actually "fair", is not easy, especially with lobbyists in the equation.

oppositelock 8y ago

I pay my taxes because I'd be in jail if I didn't. So much of what I pay goes to killing people all over the world, spreading the US hegemony, and jailing people for victimless "crimes" which I personally consider to be non-issues, that I'm disgusted each year when I tabulate my taxes. So, you feel pride, I feel disgust. Society does have a cost, but building shared infrastructure and whatnot doesn't have to be funded via just one mechanism, one which can do whatever it feels like all over the world.

dwaltrip 8y ago
Which government would you rather give your tax money to?
- BLKNSLVR 8y ago
  Don't use the excuse that your government couldn't do better just because others are worse. That ends up being the race to the bottom that we're currently witnessing.
  - dwaltrip 8y ago
    I didn't mean to justify the status quo, merely to point out the difficulties. We should absolutely work to improve things. But we shouldn't do so blindly.

akudha 8y ago

I'm a foreigner in the US and am thankful for the public infrastructure (even the old ones) and more than happy to pay taxes. I find a lot of Americans complain about taxes (even those who are on welfare, forgetting that taxes paid by others is what helping them in the first place). I went to my local library to become a member. The old lady there asked me if I live in the area and launched a lecture (even after I showed address proof) about how she is paying her taxes and she wants to make sure her "tax dollars" are used only by those in the area etc. The whole thing was bizarre. What is interesting is that taxes in US are actually lower than many European countries. Sure, the federal gov isn't the most efficient one, but hating taxes THIS much just feels weird and wrong to me. Without taxes, civilization as we know will collapse

smsm42 8y ago
Your local library most likely is supported by local property taxes, not federal income taxes. Though there are federal grants available for specific library improvements sometimes.
jki275 8y ago
The US was founded in a tax revolt. It all makes sense if you think about it a bit.

smsm42 8y ago

I fail to find any pride in being forced to pay the price I have no influence over for goods I have no say in either production or distribution. Yes, I know that that's what I signed for when moving into the US to live as a non-citizen alien (not that becoming a citizen would change anything - voting in California, esp. SV part, is next to useless, the outcomes are predetermined anyway), and it's probably a better deal than most of other countries would offer me (that's why I took it), but it doesn't make me bubbling with joy. I recognize that there's probably no realistic way to avoid it, but as it is for a person having to take drugs due to chronic illness, recognizing the necessity of having to do something does not mean being happy or proud about it. It's just a part of harsh reality. Especially if you take interest in particular details of how the massive trillion-size budgets are spent and how much money is wasted or stolen (illegally or legally) from it. No, platitudes of "society has a cost" do not do much for me. Food has a cost too, but if I'm offered a McDonald's sandwich for $100, I may pay for it and eat it, if all other food around is worse and more expensive, but I won't be proud or happy about it. And would take any legal effort available to me to keep my money out of the taxman's reach. When I feel the need to contribute to some cause, I just open my favorite charities list (unfortunately, much longer than my budget - after taxes - affords me to support adequately) and donate there.

oTTjRQxkTz 8y ago

I don't take pride at all. It is burdensome, worrying, and hostile for the following reasons. 1) My taxes are overly complicated. I have to hire lawyers and accountants to help. They have made mistakes but I am still liable. 2) My tax bracket pays a very high rate. With state taxes included I am near 50% on income. I don't think that's reasonable and the justification, in my opinion, is more based on a suspicion or dislike of people in my bracket than because I can afford to pay. The government spends far more than it's revenue anyways. If my bracket were moved to 100%, there would still be revenue deficits. 3) The IRS treats me as if I am hiding money. The higher your bracket it seems the more likely you are to be audited. My father has been audited multiple times. I have been audited once. It is not a pleasant experience and every letter the IRS sends causes more anxiety. Honest or trivial mistakes are treated as if done with criminal intent. 4) Nearly half the population does not pay taxes but can elect people who can choose what my rates are. I will never have a majority representation or much power to lower them. This doesn't seem fair to me. 5) The IRS can very well be incompetent or corrupt in the sense of being political but no one will admit that. The assumption is generally that tax cheats are a problem but not a biased IRS. For me to be proud, I think lowering my rate, simplifying taxes, requiring more Americans to pay, even if it is just a few dollars, and putting something in place to report overzealous IRS agents or corruption there would go a long way.

beatgammit 8y ago
I agree with most of what you said, but it seems silly to have everyone pay into taxes when they're net receivers of benefits. The more important thing IMO is that the government is not careful with the money we give it, and it supports causes the majority disagree with (e.g. upholding the federal marijuana ban). When you couple runaway spending with a feeling of lack of representation, paying taxes feels more like extortion than "paying your share". If having everyone pay a little in taxes means they're more likely to vote for responsible spending, I'm all for it. But the tax system is so convoluted that many people think they're making money with their refund. Maybe having few people get a refund would be better, IDK. But the current system makes people apathetic toward federal spending.
- 8y ago

conanbatt 8y ago

The people that direct how taxes are spent have campaigned for a century to make people feel good about paying them. The truth is revealed when someone refuses to pay, and suddently the prideful contributions become mandatory commandments, under threats of confiscation and ultimately restriction of freedom.

zamalek 8y ago

I was raised a Catholic and, while not everything stuck with me, "give to Ceasar what is Ceasar's" did. The work that taxes do, at least in WA, make it a fair bargain too (where in South Africa it was daylight robbery).

isoskeles 8y ago

I take no pride in it. I had terrible experiences with the public school system growing up, and I doubt it's been fixed since then. I do not trust the government to do the right thing as a result. The government is yet another organization made up of people (or really, smaller organizations made up of people) who aren't necessarily doing their job correctly (or incorrectly, to be fair). Also, our "society" and the government are not the same thing. Paying taxes to the government is not the same thing as paying your dues to society. As an example, if I have to pick between which person "contributes" to "society" more, a person who pays $0 in taxes because they work but earn very little versus a person who pays $0 in taxes because all their income is made illegally through theft, I can easily point to the former as being a better contributor to society. Similarly, one could make a case against the contributions of someone who pays a lot in taxes because they own a business that harms the environment or has other negative externalities. The point is that taxes are a rather poor measure of contribution to society. It's simply a reward of resources to government which, at least in the US, transforms those resources into a lot of shit including death in other countries. I will admit that I think this is all necessary in order for the whole system to work, but I'm not going to pretend that the government is good or even, simply, not as bad as corporations. The attitude that taxes are something to be prideful about just seems like cheerleading. Not making a personal dig at you, that's just how I feel about the attitude. And personally, I'll probably never feel prideful in contributing to taxes. Or maybe when I start receiving social security in several decades. Basically, it would take a lot to convince me that my previous most significant experience with the government (through my education) is unimportant and these other reasons (A, B, C, etc.) over here -- that I've had no personal experience with -- show that government is actually really very good and I should be proud to pay taxes.

InitialLastName 8y ago
> Similarly, one could make a case against the contributions of someone who pays a lot in taxes because they own a business that harms the environment or has other negative externalities. I think there's a strong case to be made that one of the most fundamental justifications for taxes is to cover the cost of negative externalities.