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The cornerstone of a fair tax system is to avoid double taxation. Most countries currently practice triple taxation - they tax personal income, they tax the sam

The cornerstone of a fair tax system is to avoid double taxation. Most countries currently practice triple taxation - they tax personal income, they tax the same income again through taxes on consumption, and a third time through corporate tax. And then there are still countless other small taxes. A fair system would tax people once, on their earnings, and stop there. So, to answer your question, there should be no corporate tax, and no VAT, if income tax is set at the correct level. It makes no sense for you, as an individual, to compare yourself to a corporation.

ClumsyPilot 3y ago
> So, to answer your question, there should be no corporate tax, and no VAT, if income tax is set at the correct level. It makes no sense for you, as an individual, to compare yourself to a corporation. This is outrageous. Why does, in your world, a corporation have amore rights than a real person? On the contrary, there should be no personal income tax, only Corporate taxes.
- christophilus 3y ago
  Or no taxes other than a flat national sales tax, probably with some rebate to assist the poorest X% of families.
  - landemva 3y ago
    And repeal the income tax. And exempt from sales tax uncooked food at grocery stores.
  - notahacker 3y ago
    Which, like the "only income tax" would enrich the hereditary wealth dynasties at the expense of the sort of people that actually have to spend most of their income.
- pitaj 3y ago
  Corporate taxes are among the taxes with the highest dead weight loss, and the cost just gets passed on as lower worker compensation or higher prices of goods and services. The overhead associated with corporate taxes is also much higher for small businesses.
  - ameister14 3y ago
    I know that's what a set of economists say theoretically happens, but I'm not sure that's actually borne out in the data. If you look at periods of wage stagnation and/or inflation, they aren't exactly positively correlated with relative high corporate taxes.
  - tanaros 3y ago
    > the cost just gets passed on as lower worker compensation This applies to payroll taxes, but I don’t think it applies to corporate income taxes. Since corporate income taxes are typically levied against profit, not revenue, wages are paid out of “pre-tax” money. A high corporate income tax rate would actually incentivize paying higher wages and/or hiring more employees.
dTal 3y ago
>The cornerstone of a fair tax system is to avoid double taxation That's pretty arguable. To me, "fair" simply means that we all obey the same rules. Those rules can be anything we want, if we think they'll make society work better. In our current system, taxes are levied on money movement, which serves important functions. These functions include signalling to the economy which activities we'd like to encourage and discourage, and providing fair and proportionate funding to government services which deal with that specific activity. For instance, road tax is levied only on car users, and goes towards the maintenance of the infrastructure which car users disproportionately benefit from. That is much more "fair" than what you are suggesting. When you use terms like "double taxation", you are presupposing that tax is "attached to a person", and that income tax is the only "valid" form of tax, which is a radical departure from how most of the world thinks about tax - a fact you acknowledge. >It makes no sense for you, as an individual, to compare yourself to a corporation. I agree with this, but probably not the way that you mean. Apple isn't even a person. It deserves no consideration of things like "rights" and "personal sovereignty". It's merely an organization - essentially, a pile of paperwork - that exists entirely subordinate to the parameters that we agree on through the engine of representative democracy, which is our current best effort at creating an avatar of societal cooperation, for the benefit of all. Ethically, we would be entirely within our rights to tax Apple at a rate of 100%, if we felt it would be a net benefit to society as a whole.
- di456 3y ago
  > Apple isn't even a person Legally, that pile of paperwork gives the Apple corporation some rights of a person. Obviously it is not a living, breathing person in the biological sense. But it is treated as one from a legal perspective. Should it be? That's a different question. Changing that would probably upend contract law. IANAL https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporate_personhood https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporate_personhood

ClumsyPilot 3y ago

> So, to answer your question, there should be no corporate tax, and no VAT, if income tax is set at the correct level. It makes no sense for you, as an individual, to compare yourself to a corporation. This is outrageous. Why does, in your world, a corporation have amore rights than a real person? On the contrary, there should be no personal income tax, only Corporate taxes.

christophilus 3y ago
Or no taxes other than a flat national sales tax, probably with some rebate to assist the poorest X% of families.
- landemva 3y ago
  And repeal the income tax. And exempt from sales tax uncooked food at grocery stores.
- notahacker 3y ago
  Which, like the "only income tax" would enrich the hereditary wealth dynasties at the expense of the sort of people that actually have to spend most of their income.
pitaj 3y ago
Corporate taxes are among the taxes with the highest dead weight loss, and the cost just gets passed on as lower worker compensation or higher prices of goods and services. The overhead associated with corporate taxes is also much higher for small businesses.
- ameister14 3y ago
  I know that's what a set of economists say theoretically happens, but I'm not sure that's actually borne out in the data. If you look at periods of wage stagnation and/or inflation, they aren't exactly positively correlated with relative high corporate taxes.
- tanaros 3y ago
  > the cost just gets passed on as lower worker compensation This applies to payroll taxes, but I don’t think it applies to corporate income taxes. Since corporate income taxes are typically levied against profit, not revenue, wages are paid out of “pre-tax” money. A high corporate income tax rate would actually incentivize paying higher wages and/or hiring more employees.

dTal 3y ago

>The cornerstone of a fair tax system is to avoid double taxation That's pretty arguable. To me, "fair" simply means that we all obey the same rules. Those rules can be anything we want, if we think they'll make society work better. In our current system, taxes are levied on money movement, which serves important functions. These functions include signalling to the economy which activities we'd like to encourage and discourage, and providing fair and proportionate funding to government services which deal with that specific activity. For instance, road tax is levied only on car users, and goes towards the maintenance of the infrastructure which car users disproportionately benefit from. That is much more "fair" than what you are suggesting. When you use terms like "double taxation", you are presupposing that tax is "attached to a person", and that income tax is the only "valid" form of tax, which is a radical departure from how most of the world thinks about tax - a fact you acknowledge. >It makes no sense for you, as an individual, to compare yourself to a corporation. I agree with this, but probably not the way that you mean. Apple isn't even a person. It deserves no consideration of things like "rights" and "personal sovereignty". It's merely an organization - essentially, a pile of paperwork - that exists entirely subordinate to the parameters that we agree on through the engine of representative democracy, which is our current best effort at creating an avatar of societal cooperation, for the benefit of all. Ethically, we would be entirely within our rights to tax Apple at a rate of 100%, if we felt it would be a net benefit to society as a whole.

di456 3y ago
> Apple isn't even a person Legally, that pile of paperwork gives the Apple corporation some rights of a person. Obviously it is not a living, breathing person in the biological sense. But it is treated as one from a legal perspective. Should it be? That's a different question. Changing that would probably upend contract law. IANAL https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporate_personhood https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporate_personhood