3 ms·

If principal is your thing why not take the tax difference and appropriate the funds by donating to your principal causes?

wahern 8y ago
If you want low taxes and little government regulation why not move to a banana republic?[1] The answer is because we don't live in a vacuum--policies matter, otherwise you're just pissing into the wind. The entire purpose of government is to overcome the free rider problem. If you can't rely on people acting in the same socially responsible manner, then doing it alone (especially at scale) is not only fruitless, it can be outright counterproductive. Coordination of socially responsible behavior is a mixture of social, political, legal, and cultural (e.g. religious) norms. In a diverse society the political and legals components are particularly important. [1] That's not an entirely rhetorical question. I've met people in South America who have done exactly this. One was a gold standard proponent who found some success in Ecuador as a real estate broker and manager for expat investors. Another was roaming around some pretty sketchy areas of Venezuela, Columbia, and Ecuador looking for a place to settle--his wife got tired of his anti-Bush, anti-Obama rants, called his bluff and told him to go figure things out and call her when he found a place to settle. Those two left the U.S. specifically because of their libertarian political beliefs. I've met many others with more mixed motivations. EDIT: I respect those two for leaving. Remember, Socrates chose death over leaving Athens, but was he trying to make a particular point. Exile was nonetheless an ethically acceptable option, too. What's not ethically acceptable is staying and skirting the rules. The analogous acceptable behavior in this case would be moving to Texas to make your point but paying your California taxes on the IPO as the ethically responsible thing.
- marcrosoft 8y ago
  > The entire purpose of government is to overcome the free rider problem. Can you expand on this? The U.S. was founded by people who fled to find reprieve from taxes and a government that you could describe as a"free loader".
  - wahern 8y ago
    Most colonists fled religious persecution or were seeking economic opportunity, and in some cases were moving to a place with more onerous taxes. The founding of independent government was about political self-determination. It most assuredly was not anti-tax. Nowhere in the newfound state governments was taxation limited; rather, AFAIU in all the new states the power to tax given to the legislature was absolute and unlimited! Federal taxation was limited, but that was out of concern for preserving the self-determination of each individual state. The guiding principle behind early American politics was that representative democracy was sufficient to constrain unfair taxation. In fact, the inability of the federal government to fund itself through direct taxation of the people, instead having to rely on funding from state governments which it could not compel, is one of the most important reasons the Articles of Confederation were deemed a failure. The new U.S. Constitution conspicuously granted the new federal government direct taxation powers. I think many people today, both liberal and conservative, would agree that the Founders' ideas about taxation were too simplistic. Conservatives might want more structural limitations, and liberals might want rules about distribution. But the Founders were definitely not anti-taxation. Early Americans weren't, "No taxation!" They were, "No taxation without representation!"

wahern 8y ago

If you want low taxes and little government regulation why not move to a banana republic?[1] The answer is because we don't live in a vacuum--policies matter, otherwise you're just pissing into the wind. The entire purpose of government is to overcome the free rider problem. If you can't rely on people acting in the same socially responsible manner, then doing it alone (especially at scale) is not only fruitless, it can be outright counterproductive. Coordination of socially responsible behavior is a mixture of social, political, legal, and cultural (e.g. religious) norms. In a diverse society the political and legals components are particularly important. [1] That's not an entirely rhetorical question. I've met people in South America who have done exactly this. One was a gold standard proponent who found some success in Ecuador as a real estate broker and manager for expat investors. Another was roaming around some pretty sketchy areas of Venezuela, Columbia, and Ecuador looking for a place to settle--his wife got tired of his anti-Bush, anti-Obama rants, called his bluff and told him to go figure things out and call her when he found a place to settle. Those two left the U.S. specifically because of their libertarian political beliefs. I've met many others with more mixed motivations. EDIT: I respect those two for leaving. Remember, Socrates chose death over leaving Athens, but was he trying to make a particular point. Exile was nonetheless an ethically acceptable option, too. What's not ethically acceptable is staying and skirting the rules. The analogous acceptable behavior in this case would be moving to Texas to make your point but paying your California taxes on the IPO as the ethically responsible thing.

marcrosoft 8y ago
> The entire purpose of government is to overcome the free rider problem. Can you expand on this? The U.S. was founded by people who fled to find reprieve from taxes and a government that you could describe as a"free loader".
- wahern 8y ago
  Most colonists fled religious persecution or were seeking economic opportunity, and in some cases were moving to a place with more onerous taxes. The founding of independent government was about political self-determination. It most assuredly was not anti-tax. Nowhere in the newfound state governments was taxation limited; rather, AFAIU in all the new states the power to tax given to the legislature was absolute and unlimited! Federal taxation was limited, but that was out of concern for preserving the self-determination of each individual state. The guiding principle behind early American politics was that representative democracy was sufficient to constrain unfair taxation. In fact, the inability of the federal government to fund itself through direct taxation of the people, instead having to rely on funding from state governments which it could not compel, is one of the most important reasons the Articles of Confederation were deemed a failure. The new U.S. Constitution conspicuously granted the new federal government direct taxation powers. I think many people today, both liberal and conservative, would agree that the Founders' ideas about taxation were too simplistic. Conservatives might want more structural limitations, and liberals might want rules about distribution. But the Founders were definitely not anti-taxation. Early Americans weren't, "No taxation!" They were, "No taxation without representation!"