I was talking on the phone to a friend earlier and he was telling me about how he was robbed several times back when he lived in Manhattan. One time, the burglers took absolutely everything - including his dirty laundry! His neighbour told him that he could go to a place on 29th street to buy it back.
I regularly hear libertarians say that taxation is theft. A lot of other people hear libertarians say it too, and it all sounds a bit extreme to them. It's not as if the government is breaking into their home at night to steal taxes. It also doesn't help that people who say it are usually foaming at the mouth like a rabid dog with a mouth full of toothpaste.
Copycats
I don't know who was the first to say it, but there was a guy named Murray Rothbard who wrote a book in the early 1980's in which he said it. A bunch of copycats latched onto it and began to furiously force the phrase upon others, even though they didn't practice Rothbard's other idea of tax resistance (neither did Rothbard, to my knowledge).
Fair Taxes
You're not likely to hear me talking about a fair tax. The reason why people pay them is because the government forces them to. Failure to pay will result in the confiscation of at least some of your property or even imprisonment, and you don't want to go to prison because they don't have Internet.
When comparing various types of taxes to one another, it's more appropriate to talk about which ones are 'less unfair' or 'less bad'. Milton Friedman famously declared land value tax to be the "least bad tax", and I'd have to agree. I would also say that sales tax is the most unfair or immoral tax - it's regressive, distortionary and is taxing money that's been taxed already!
Progressive Income Taxes
Progressive income taxes are like libertarians who support and defend authoritarians like Donald Trump - the label they've given themselves is a complete lie!
Farts
I sometimes hear people say that fiat money only has value because people have faith that it has value. When I point out that they're wrong, they often begin to splutter like a wet fart.
The money that government creates has value because it's the only thing that the government will accept for the payment of taxes. Fiat money is nothing more than tax credits which the government exchanges for goods and services. When you hand back those tax credits, they cease to exist, along with your tax liability (for now).
That's why some people say that cryptocurrencies aren't money - because you can't use them to pay taxes to any national government in the World. I'd say that money is whatever people happen to use as money, but at least you know why people say that about them.
Taxes are not theft. They are, in fact... (drumroll, please) extortion!
You Wrote An Entire Post Just To Say That?
Hey, terminology matters! If you bang on about how taxes are theft, most people are going to continue looking at you as though you have two heads. But if you say that taxes are extortion and back it up with facts about how the money system works, then they have no choice but to upvote you!
Here's an image I whipped up for you to add to your cocktail party icebreaker toolkit:
Have you read the book by @larkenrose about his attempts to reveal the convoluted deception of the US tax system (I am still trying to get through it but a fascinating read about governments and the tax system)? If so I would be very interested in your thoughts :)
I haven’t, but I know that complex tax systems allow scope for minimising ones tax liability. If the bureaucrats understand it well enough to put up a fight, they’re offered private sector jobs to get them out of the way.
Generally speaking, the less money you earn, the worse things are for you. ‘Progressive’ income taxes are never progressive.
Apparently it is a lot simpler than that... it seems like nowhere in the tax laws does it specify that what people think as normal income is actually taxable. @larkenrose has communicated this in a lot of different social media platforms and I am still trying to finish reading the whole story but it is quite fascinating whichever way you think about it (that this gap exists and that someone could find something like this and be punished for it).
I remember reading stuff about that a few years ago and seeing a video of some former IRS worker saying that she couldn't find any law that compelled people to pay federal taxes. She stopped paying taxes, someone found the law and she went to jail.
Interesting. From what I read of larkenrose's book, he couldn't find any law that specified income deriving from within the US by ordinary citizens to be taxable, and they couldn't find him guilty of wilfully not paying tax, but he went to jail anyway. Unfortunately no such loopholes seem to exist in the Australian Tax Laws, so people have to exploit it in other ways :p
It isn’t what current legislation actually states, but how that legislation is interpreted by the courts, who will be the ones banging the gavel before they find you guilty. They know who butters their bread.
It is a peculiar article of libertarian ideas. But it does fit the form and philosophy of ahistoricity, simplification and hyperbole.
I’m very interested in hearing your ideas. It’s true that I rambled on when the entire article could have been reduced to “taxes aren’t theft; they’re extortion”. It’s a simple concept and I can understand that it may be an over simplification in a given context, so from which angle are you coming?
No I meant libertarian idea specifically, not your post.
Great article. I would say Sales Tax is fair if it replaced regular income tax all together.
I would have to agree with most of the points in your article. But we also have to look at the reason why the government needs tax...most of that money goes into the development of infrastructure in many countries which would then become the burden of landowners otherwise but yeah no government is perfect...so a lot of that money is also lost.
First and foremost illusion the elite has convinced people is that the governments own the lands and Earth. And, that for you to use it you have to pay for it. Somehow they have throughout history convinced people there are ROYAL, ELITE, SPECIAL PEOPLE, who own Earth. Nobody owns Earth, it belongs to every single of us. You have to pay for everything you do. So bring the question?
What this types of systems like Republic, Democracy, or whatever they call it do anything different than tyranny or feudalism You still have to pay for invisible servieces to farm your land, you have to give them a piece of everything YOU WORK FOR. There is no difference. Only the punishements for not doing so have changed. They have "civilized" a bit. lol That is all, nothing is different, which I don't see how people don't see? We are FREE my ass. Try not to pay taxes and see what happens.
In U.S there is actually no written law that obligates you to need to pay taxes. That is one another matter for another time.
Plus you are paying money to the governments elected by fake promises. Which they never keep because they controlled by secret groups and societies. The give themselves outrages high salaries for what? For absolutely nothing. I am taking America for example who takes that money and wages wars on other countries while their country is full of homeless people and people without jobs. How is that using the TAX money to help their people. It is the pretty much similar to any cuntry governments around the world.
Great article, enjoyed reading it. I am sorry for the long comment. lol
Have a great day. :)
lol, I enjoyed reading your article. I have a better understanding about taxes than most and im not gonna lie, i use the saying "tax is theft" often. But I totally understand where you are coming from in this article and really like how you laid it out. You are right, most people who use that term have no idea about economics in this county, they just like to bitch!
I tend explain the government and taxes like the mob, sure you can try to not pay them, but life will really suck! Is that theft? maybe not.. But like you said, its EXTORTION for sure!
Thanks again for the unique article, I really enjoyed it.
"full upvote & following*
Interesting post, I enjoyed reading it thanks!
It seems to me that you have two options with taxes
So I try to reduce my tax to as little as possible, and then I pay it
Cheers