4 ms·

In another post I likened the government with an investor. It invests in you and everyone else, and thus owns part of what you create with that investment. The

In another post I likened the government with an investor. It invests in you and everyone else, and thus owns part of what you create with that investment. The difference is, if I receive venture capital for a share of my business, I don't get to decide one day that I've paid enough to them and take my business elsewhere. Why should it work differently in society? Society invests in everyone, but not everyone makes it big. For the system to function, you need to hold up your end of the bargain. Instead, we get a race to the bottom. It's particularly apparent in the US, where even individual states try to steal businesses from other states with lower tax rates and perks.

DigitalJack 14y ago
That is an interesting take. I feel like you have the relationship backward though. The taxpayer is investing in government. I am purchasing (renting really) the use of infrastructure and police protection. Except it is compulsory, so it isn't even fair to call it investing. It is far more akin to the cliche of the mafia extorting protection money. You pay the mob, they keep lowlifes away from your business. You don't pay, you are punished, severely. I feel no more allegiance to my government than I do my local grocery store. Actually I probably feel more for the grocery store because they are much better at what they do than the government is at what it is doing. And I have some choice. If the quality goes down at my current store, I will take my business elsewhere. I certainly don't think I should keep sending money to the old grocery store when I've moved on to a new one. And that is the way the law is written in the US. You pay taxes for the current year. It's not indentured servitude.
- purplelobster 14y ago
  Why do you think my view is backwards specifically? Can we agree that businesses and individuals in general tend to succeed according to the power law? On average, in a population, there will be a very few extremely successful individuals, a moderate amount of fairly successful, and a vast majority that aren't very successful. All evidence from every society of every corner of this world seems to indicate this. I think this holds true with both businesses and individuals if left by their own accord. If this assumption is true, it would be impossible to look at society membership as a simple "fee" or renting. This will simply hit a majority of people disproportionately hard. In my world, it makes much more sense to take an analogy from the investing world. Investors have to invest in many duds before getting a payoff. If investors simply required a one-time fee for helping a company out, they could simply not exist unless that fee was extremely large. You might want to argue that the successful people rightly deserve their exponential wealth, but I believe that circumstance and chance is a large factor in success, and I also believe that it's in the best interest of the successful to fund the failures to some degree. Again, all evidence I've seen points to high income inequality being the main perpetrator in criminality, unhappiness and overall societal disfunction. Full disclosure: I grew up in Sweden, so my view on government will probably be fundamentally different from yours. The Swedish system has many problems but also many benefits. I have seen enough benefits that I would gladly pay the high tax rate, yet there are many in Sweden who don't.
  - clarky07 14y ago
    I think a lot of people end up characterizing this poorly, and there is a lot of propaganda on both sides of this issue. For me, paying taxes isn't a problem. Even paying more taxes than people who pay less is perfectly fine. The problem is I see far too much waste and far too little benefit. The revenues that the government is currently getting is more than enough to fund the things that most people want funded. The problem is we are also spending huge amounts of money on things that only a few special interest groups want. Roads are awesome. Police are great. I'm glad we have a military. etc. But that's only a small part of our total spending. The OP is from France, and that is how this discussion started. I think they have a 75% top tax rate. To me that seems really absurd, and is way past the point of paying someones fair share, or "paying back" any investment in them. To follow your analogy, did they get 75% equity in him? Were the roads really that key to his success?
    - PierreA 14y ago
      it's 75% after 1M euros (before it is 45% maximum). and I believe there is a lot of ways to prevent from paying this (eg if you do an investment in french island)

DigitalJack 14y ago

That is an interesting take. I feel like you have the relationship backward though. The taxpayer is investing in government. I am purchasing (renting really) the use of infrastructure and police protection. Except it is compulsory, so it isn't even fair to call it investing. It is far more akin to the cliche of the mafia extorting protection money. You pay the mob, they keep lowlifes away from your business. You don't pay, you are punished, severely. I feel no more allegiance to my government than I do my local grocery store. Actually I probably feel more for the grocery store because they are much better at what they do than the government is at what it is doing. And I have some choice. If the quality goes down at my current store, I will take my business elsewhere. I certainly don't think I should keep sending money to the old grocery store when I've moved on to a new one. And that is the way the law is written in the US. You pay taxes for the current year. It's not indentured servitude.

purplelobster 14y ago
Why do you think my view is backwards specifically? Can we agree that businesses and individuals in general tend to succeed according to the power law? On average, in a population, there will be a very few extremely successful individuals, a moderate amount of fairly successful, and a vast majority that aren't very successful. All evidence from every society of every corner of this world seems to indicate this. I think this holds true with both businesses and individuals if left by their own accord. If this assumption is true, it would be impossible to look at society membership as a simple "fee" or renting. This will simply hit a majority of people disproportionately hard. In my world, it makes much more sense to take an analogy from the investing world. Investors have to invest in many duds before getting a payoff. If investors simply required a one-time fee for helping a company out, they could simply not exist unless that fee was extremely large. You might want to argue that the successful people rightly deserve their exponential wealth, but I believe that circumstance and chance is a large factor in success, and I also believe that it's in the best interest of the successful to fund the failures to some degree. Again, all evidence I've seen points to high income inequality being the main perpetrator in criminality, unhappiness and overall societal disfunction. Full disclosure: I grew up in Sweden, so my view on government will probably be fundamentally different from yours. The Swedish system has many problems but also many benefits. I have seen enough benefits that I would gladly pay the high tax rate, yet there are many in Sweden who don't.
- clarky07 14y ago
  I think a lot of people end up characterizing this poorly, and there is a lot of propaganda on both sides of this issue. For me, paying taxes isn't a problem. Even paying more taxes than people who pay less is perfectly fine. The problem is I see far too much waste and far too little benefit. The revenues that the government is currently getting is more than enough to fund the things that most people want funded. The problem is we are also spending huge amounts of money on things that only a few special interest groups want. Roads are awesome. Police are great. I'm glad we have a military. etc. But that's only a small part of our total spending. The OP is from France, and that is how this discussion started. I think they have a 75% top tax rate. To me that seems really absurd, and is way past the point of paying someones fair share, or "paying back" any investment in them. To follow your analogy, did they get 75% equity in him? Were the roads really that key to his success?
  - PierreA 14y ago
    it's 75% after 1M euros (before it is 45% maximum). and I believe there is a lot of ways to prevent from paying this (eg if you do an investment in french island)