Comment by Kevin_S | Hacker News Reader

Comment by Kevin_S | Hacker News Reader

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> Taxation is moral so long as it is spent on programs that benefit everyone. The military, roads, a court system, the post office, police, etc. > Taxation is immoral when you take from someone you "feel" has to much money and give it to someone you think "deserves" it.

Dude... you're just framing it differently. You can easily look at UBI and taxes as they currently are as moneys from individuals that go into a large pot which is then spent to help the greater good. Roads do that, police do that, and so does public assistance programs like social security and welfare. But somehow UBI is different because it is cash? It's all the same. It does the same basic thing: lower income inequality.

It isn't "feeling" they have too much money and "deserving" it. It would be a calculated number that is used to maximize total utility of the economy. You're the one making the emotional argument here.

Not sure why anyone these days would oppose a system that would lower income inequality from the absurd point it has reached.

I'll try and be more specific.

If there are ten people in a country and money is dispersed in this way:

Bottom 2 each have $10 Middle 6 each have $20 Top 2 each have $50

I would support a system that takes say... 10% from everyone.

Bottom 2 are taxed $1 each == $2 Middle 6 are taxed $2 each == $12 Top 2 are taxed $5 each = $10

They then put all of the money in a "pot" to be spent on a military. This benefits everyone because a poor homeless person in Alabama will be defended equally as well as a middle class secretary in Georgia.

However, if you tax the Top 2 for an extra 10% which comes out to $10 more and then put it in a "pot" that will only be spent on the Bottom 2, we have a problem.

This is a problem because you are treating 20% of the population unfairly simply because they have more money than the other 80%. This is being charitable with their money and not letting them decide to do with it as they please. I support the poor in my own way by donating money, volunteering for charity, etc. but it is wrong for you to take a larger percent of my money and give it to another group of people for arbitrary reasons.

> It would be a calculated number that is used to maximize total utility of the economy.

I would love to see the geniuses and God level economists who can make those calculations and factor in every aspect of the economy. You can't, it's impossible.

Riches have more to gain from a working society and more to loose from a failing one.

Or as Adam Smith puts it: "Civil government, so far as it is instituted for the security of property, is in reality instituted for the defence of the rich against the poor, or of those who have some property against those who have none at all."

In that sense, it's quite natural that the richer you are the more you contribute.

It's interesting that in your example you seem to tax wealth and not income. I don't know of any country in which the tax system is based around wealth and not income.

And indeed, a flat tax on wealth would probably be the fairest tax, but I imagine that it's a lot harder to do than taxing income or consumption.

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