6 ms·

I disagree. From what I understand, he is not talking about government needing the money, but society needing the money (in his example, which is, after all, th

by skore 14y ago

I disagree. From what I understand, he is not talking about government needing the money, but society needing the money (in his example, which is, after all, the central reason for his post, he talks about him taking in money for a group of people to organize an event for everybody). This maps well to his addressing those "strawmen" libertarians. Most libertarian rhetoric builds on the fact that people have been made suspicious of government and are suggested to think of government as "the other". Likewise, you seem to try to force his argument on its head - Nobody argues whether government should exist and you suggesting it makes me wonder how closely you've read the post. "The Government" is the subgroup of society who have been elected by the rest of society to invest part of societies resources to the advantage to everybody. The basic math being that society will be better off having spent the money in that way than had it kept the money. Whether or not you agree that that is happening, that is the basic plan. Tims post simply says: If we want to be a society, that comes at a cost and somebody has to pick up the tab at the end of the night and the system to make that happen is called taxation. Claiming that this in itself "fallacious argument" because you actually know what his argument is seems ambitious, but I simply have no idea where you take that from. Let's argue the reverse: Since you don't seem to disagree that a government in itself is a good concept, who do you think should pay the price for it?

jimmyvanhalen 14y ago
Everybody's favorite ad company is also doing the same thing btw. Google 2.4% Rate Shows How $60 Billion Lost to Tax Loopholes Google Inc. cut its taxes by $3.1 billion in the last three years using a technique that moves most of its foreign profits through Ireland and the Netherlands to Bermuda. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-10-21/google-2-4-rate-shows-how-60-billion-u-s-revenue-lost-to-tax-loopholes.html http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-10-21/google-2-4-rate-sho...
jerf 14y ago
"If we want to be a society, that comes at a cost and somebody has to pick up the tab at the end of the night and the system to make that happen is called taxation." Your own summary simply repeats the fallacy. That someone must pick up the tab does not imply that the tab must be larger than it is today, or that the tab must be paid for by this particular chunk of money. It does not follow. It is not a logical argument. It isn't even about libertarianism. It doesn't even rise to the level of an argument against libertarianism, because it isn't well-formed enough to even be called a proper argument. "We need a thing" and "We need more of a thing" are two completely different arguments, and you shouldn't allow one argument to be substituted for another without noticing.
- skore 14y ago
  Well, that's another thing that nobody is arguing. Maybe that really is where you misunderstand Tim's position: He does not say we need more taxation, he says that there are actors in the game that do not pay their fair share. You're doing your own argument a disservice by trying to modify the position of your opponent. That's not how discussions work. The position that Tim (and I) argue is simple: There is X amount of money that it costs to run society. While, yes, we constantly have to figure out what that amount is, there is no question that it should be paid by everybody in that society. And that the stronger players (who both benefit most from a well funded society and who have the most to give) should be decent enough to step in appropriately.
  - carbocation 14y ago
    Were you 'decent enough' to pay more in taxes than you owed this year? Of course not. Why should anyone else feel compelled to do so?
    - skore 14y ago
      Phew, I'm not sure whether I even have to respond to that non sequitur. Obviously I'm not a big corporation and obviously we're talking about tax loopholes here, not paying extra taxes on top of what you owe.
      - tedunangst 14y ago
        What is a loophole, if not something that reduces the amount of tax you owe? Concretely, how do you propose Apple calculate how much tax they owe if "the amount the law requires" is not the correct amount?
        vacri 14y ago
        I'm sure it was the intent of the framers of tax law that large corporations should funnel a third of their income to a different country as part of "the amount the law requires".
adventureful 14y ago
If only most of the taxes the government takes actually went to benefit society. At least then there could be a sympathetic argument made for where $6 trillion goes each year. That's $30,000 per adult, per year, in taxes (local+state+federal). The equation: government == society, is false. Some governments are effective and efficient, some are not; some work for the people, some work against the people, and in varying degrees. We take as much money out of the economy through all forms of taxation as nations such as Germany, but we don't have the results to show for it that they do. They have better roads, better healthcare, better infrastructure overall, and better education.
- skore 14y ago
  Oh absolutely. Being a German looking over the pond, I would be seriously pissed off about what happens in government if I was a US citizen. What I don't like about these discussions, particularly when they are driven by US citizens, is the amount of proud apathy or downright confused resignation that is displayed. Surely a couple of corporations have spent a proper buck to make that happen - Confuse people so thoroughly that they start questioning whether this whole democracy and society-thing is worth it to begin with.
  - jimmyvanhalen 14y ago
    How is your country doing with your high tax rates? Do you ever wonder why we are the center of the universe? Do you ever wonder why Apple, Google, Facebook, etc. were all started here in America? In 1978 Congress for once did the sensible thing and slashed capital gains taxes: This resulted in the supply of venture capital exploding. By the start of 1979 a massive commitment to venture capital funds had taken place, rising from a pathetic $39 million in 1977 to a staggering $570 million at the end of 1978. Tax collections on long-term capital gains, despite the dire predictions of Keynesian big-spending critics of tax cuts, leapt from $8.5 billion in 1978 to $10.6 billion in 1979, $16.5 billion in 1983, and $23.7 billion in 1985. By 1981 venture capital outlays had soared to $1.4 billion, and the total amount of venture capital had risen to $5.8 billion. In 1981 the maximum tax rate on long-term capital gains was cut to 20 percent. This resulted in the venture capital pool surging to $11.5 billion. Astonishingly enough—to conventional economists, that is—venture capital outlays rose to $1.8 billion in the midst of the 1982 depression. This was about 400 percent more than had been out-laid during the 1970s slump. In 1983 these outlays rose to nearly $3 billion....In 1982 the U.S. General Accounting Office sampled 72 companies that had been launched with venture capital since the 1978 capital-gains tax cut. The results were startling. Starting with $209 million dollars in funds, these companies had paid $350 million in federal taxes, generated $900 million in export income, and directly created 135,000 jobs.

by skore 14y ago

jimmyvanhalen 14y ago

Everybody's favorite ad company is also doing the same thing btw. Google 2.4% Rate Shows How $60 Billion Lost to Tax Loopholes Google Inc. cut its taxes by $3.1 billion in the last three years using a technique that moves most of its foreign profits through Ireland and the Netherlands to Bermuda. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-10-21/google-2-4-rate-shows-how-60-billion-u-s-revenue-lost-to-tax-loopholes.html http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-10-21/google-2-4-rate-sho...

jerf 14y ago

"If we want to be a society, that comes at a cost and somebody has to pick up the tab at the end of the night and the system to make that happen is called taxation." Your own summary simply repeats the fallacy. That someone must pick up the tab does not imply that the tab must be larger than it is today, or that the tab must be paid for by this particular chunk of money. It does not follow. It is not a logical argument. It isn't even about libertarianism. It doesn't even rise to the level of an argument against libertarianism, because it isn't well-formed enough to even be called a proper argument. "We need a thing" and "We need more of a thing" are two completely different arguments, and you shouldn't allow one argument to be substituted for another without noticing.

skore 14y ago
Well, that's another thing that nobody is arguing. Maybe that really is where you misunderstand Tim's position: He does not say we need more taxation, he says that there are actors in the game that do not pay their fair share. You're doing your own argument a disservice by trying to modify the position of your opponent. That's not how discussions work. The position that Tim (and I) argue is simple: There is X amount of money that it costs to run society. While, yes, we constantly have to figure out what that amount is, there is no question that it should be paid by everybody in that society. And that the stronger players (who both benefit most from a well funded society and who have the most to give) should be decent enough to step in appropriately.
- carbocation 14y ago
  Were you 'decent enough' to pay more in taxes than you owed this year? Of course not. Why should anyone else feel compelled to do so?
  - skore 14y ago
    Phew, I'm not sure whether I even have to respond to that non sequitur. Obviously I'm not a big corporation and obviously we're talking about tax loopholes here, not paying extra taxes on top of what you owe.
    - tedunangst 14y ago
      What is a loophole, if not something that reduces the amount of tax you owe? Concretely, how do you propose Apple calculate how much tax they owe if "the amount the law requires" is not the correct amount?
      - vacri 14y ago
        I'm sure it was the intent of the framers of tax law that large corporations should funnel a third of their income to a different country as part of "the amount the law requires".

adventureful 14y ago

If only most of the taxes the government takes actually went to benefit society. At least then there could be a sympathetic argument made for where $6 trillion goes each year. That's $30,000 per adult, per year, in taxes (local+state+federal). The equation: government == society, is false. Some governments are effective and efficient, some are not; some work for the people, some work against the people, and in varying degrees. We take as much money out of the economy through all forms of taxation as nations such as Germany, but we don't have the results to show for it that they do. They have better roads, better healthcare, better infrastructure overall, and better education.

skore 14y ago
Oh absolutely. Being a German looking over the pond, I would be seriously pissed off about what happens in government if I was a US citizen. What I don't like about these discussions, particularly when they are driven by US citizens, is the amount of proud apathy or downright confused resignation that is displayed. Surely a couple of corporations have spent a proper buck to make that happen - Confuse people so thoroughly that they start questioning whether this whole democracy and society-thing is worth it to begin with.
- jimmyvanhalen 14y ago
  How is your country doing with your high tax rates? Do you ever wonder why we are the center of the universe? Do you ever wonder why Apple, Google, Facebook, etc. were all started here in America? In 1978 Congress for once did the sensible thing and slashed capital gains taxes: This resulted in the supply of venture capital exploding. By the start of 1979 a massive commitment to venture capital funds had taken place, rising from a pathetic $39 million in 1977 to a staggering $570 million at the end of 1978. Tax collections on long-term capital gains, despite the dire predictions of Keynesian big-spending critics of tax cuts, leapt from $8.5 billion in 1978 to $10.6 billion in 1979, $16.5 billion in 1983, and $23.7 billion in 1985. By 1981 venture capital outlays had soared to $1.4 billion, and the total amount of venture capital had risen to $5.8 billion. In 1981 the maximum tax rate on long-term capital gains was cut to 20 percent. This resulted in the venture capital pool surging to $11.5 billion. Astonishingly enough—to conventional economists, that is—venture capital outlays rose to $1.8 billion in the midst of the 1982 depression. This was about 400 percent more than had been out-laid during the 1970s slump. In 1983 these outlays rose to nearly $3 billion....In 1982 the U.S. General Accounting Office sampled 72 companies that had been launched with venture capital since the 1978 capital-gains tax cut. The results were startling. Starting with $209 million dollars in funds, these companies had paid $350 million in federal taxes, generated $900 million in export income, and directly created 135,000 jobs.