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My response to this: privacy is a right. Trying to build a fair and equitable world using a tax system that relies on knowledge of everyone's finances is not o
by barnabee 5y ago
My response to this: privacy is a right.
Trying to build a fair and equitable world using a tax system that relies on knowledge of everyone's finances is not only doomed to fail but also abhorrent because it denies privacy except to the rich and powerful.
The obvious place to start with an alternative is land value tax. The Georgists have the right idea.
- Zigurd 5y agoPrivacy has always, and in every modern democracy, been subject to court orders to produce documents. There is nothing horrifying about transparency in finance. Property taxes have a role to play, for example in reducing the use of otherwise unused property to launder money. But, without other regulation, property taxes would just be a kind of sham, leaving every other avenue for money laundering wide open.
- barnabee 5y agoThere is a difference between court orders to violate privacy in narrow cases and the kind of 24/7, always-on surveillance needed to make this work fairly.
- echopurity 5y agoFinances are not private. They're created and protected by the state.
- barnabee 5y agoDownvotes: why do you disagree? Do you think it is possible to achieve the aims of a fair and equitable world through taxation? Do you think we can have sufficient financial transparency for the super rich to make them pay tax fairly compared to the rest of society? If so, why and how? Or do you just think that people have no right to privacy even when there’s no evidence they’ve done anything wrong?