4 ms·

Why? The business is built on infrastructure that is paid for with taxes. Tax is included in all end user prices in every European country I’m aware of.

sneak 4y ago
No, the business is built on infrastructure that is paid for with a tiny fraction of taxes. They are not congruent. Taxes in Europe are also much higher in general. Perhaps this is a result of obscuring the amounts in the advertised prices—it never raises to the level of conscious consideration of the tax burden at point of purchase.
- vineyardmike 4y ago
  If the government runs a deficit- which it does- then the taxes are literally too low to cover the infrastructure so it can’t be “a fraction”. Sure you can argue some of that goes to military (a safe nation is kinda infrastructure) and healthcare/Welfare (healthy and fed employees and customers are good for business too) but regardless your view on taxes, they all somehow end up back to helping the nation regardless of how efficiently or directly that happens.
  - johngladtj 4y ago
    Infrastructure is essentially a rounding error on most developed countries state expenditures. In many cases it's even self-sustaining due to licensing agreements with companies that managed the infrastructure in return for the toll revenue. The idea that the primary purpose of taxes is to provide infrastructure hasn't been true ever. The bulk of expenditures are social welfare programs and other similar handout and wealth transfer programs intended to punish the successful and reward the failures for political purposes. Social security, healthcare, education often comprise over 50% of expenditures in most first world countries. Interest and debt are also another major expenditure. The "core responsibilities of the state" , that is the military, justice system and internal security, infrastructure usually consume less than 20% of government expenditures.
    - vineyardmike 4y ago
      > The bulk of expenditures are social welfare programs and other similar handout and wealth transfer programs intended to punish the successful and reward the failures for political purposes In America this is absolutely false in every sense. It’s not the majority of the budget. They aren’t punishing success and they don’t “reward failure”. If you don’t want to succeed because a subset of your income will go helping those with bad luck then you’re welcome to be a failure. > The "core responsibilities of the state" , that is the military, justice system and internal security, infrastructure usually consume less than 20% of government expenditures. Hmm who said that was the core responsibility? I think you’re missing a bit in the list… > We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.
      - johngladtj 4y ago
        If you're going to lie you should do so on things that aren't easily checked and disproved. [0] If the 6820 billion spent by the US government in 2021, 4394 billion were spent on income security, social security, health and medicare. That's almost 65% of government expenditures going directly to wealth transfer programs. Mind you that doesn't account for all such programs (notably that value excludes education, housing, agricultural subsidies,etc...) So the real rate is actually higher. The us is not unique in these ratios in the western world. [0] https://preview.redd.it/us-government-revenue-spending-and-deficit-in-2021-v0-gcf42vjczhe91.png?auto=webp&v=enabled&s=98f4dc864b0fdf8b41486ed4099410b48b300988 https://preview.redd.it/us-government-revenue-spending-and-d...

sneak 4y ago

No, the business is built on infrastructure that is paid for with a tiny fraction of taxes. They are not congruent. Taxes in Europe are also much higher in general. Perhaps this is a result of obscuring the amounts in the advertised prices—it never raises to the level of conscious consideration of the tax burden at point of purchase.

vineyardmike 4y ago
If the government runs a deficit- which it does- then the taxes are literally too low to cover the infrastructure so it can’t be “a fraction”. Sure you can argue some of that goes to military (a safe nation is kinda infrastructure) and healthcare/Welfare (healthy and fed employees and customers are good for business too) but regardless your view on taxes, they all somehow end up back to helping the nation regardless of how efficiently or directly that happens.
- johngladtj 4y ago
  Infrastructure is essentially a rounding error on most developed countries state expenditures. In many cases it's even self-sustaining due to licensing agreements with companies that managed the infrastructure in return for the toll revenue. The idea that the primary purpose of taxes is to provide infrastructure hasn't been true ever. The bulk of expenditures are social welfare programs and other similar handout and wealth transfer programs intended to punish the successful and reward the failures for political purposes. Social security, healthcare, education often comprise over 50% of expenditures in most first world countries. Interest and debt are also another major expenditure. The "core responsibilities of the state" , that is the military, justice system and internal security, infrastructure usually consume less than 20% of government expenditures.
  - vineyardmike 4y ago
    > The bulk of expenditures are social welfare programs and other similar handout and wealth transfer programs intended to punish the successful and reward the failures for political purposes In America this is absolutely false in every sense. It’s not the majority of the budget. They aren’t punishing success and they don’t “reward failure”. If you don’t want to succeed because a subset of your income will go helping those with bad luck then you’re welcome to be a failure. > The "core responsibilities of the state" , that is the military, justice system and internal security, infrastructure usually consume less than 20% of government expenditures. Hmm who said that was the core responsibility? I think you’re missing a bit in the list… > We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.
    - johngladtj 4y ago
      If you're going to lie you should do so on things that aren't easily checked and disproved. [0] If the 6820 billion spent by the US government in 2021, 4394 billion were spent on income security, social security, health and medicare. That's almost 65% of government expenditures going directly to wealth transfer programs. Mind you that doesn't account for all such programs (notably that value excludes education, housing, agricultural subsidies,etc...) So the real rate is actually higher. The us is not unique in these ratios in the western world. [0] https://preview.redd.it/us-government-revenue-spending-and-deficit-in-2021-v0-gcf42vjczhe91.png?auto=webp&v=enabled&s=98f4dc864b0fdf8b41486ed4099410b48b300988 https://preview.redd.it/us-government-revenue-spending-and-d...