Comment by croon | Hacker News Reader

Comment by croon | Hacker News Reader

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> Regulations like minimum wage and higher taxes on larger income make it hard to hire the next marginal employee. Minimum wage prices out low skilled workers, who would like to work and obtain on the job experience needed to climb the ladder. High taxes makes it more expensive for business owners to hire someone. I'm not talking about large businesses like Walmart (they actually support minimum wage). Small businesses are going out of business, or are just not able to start with increased costs of doing business.

Minimum wage creates a much larger purchasing force, which creates more rotation on the market, thus making everyone richer.

First you mention higher taxes on larger income, but then talk about small businesses? So which is it? Are you arguing that we should tax the rich less, or that we should subsidize small businesses with lower taxes?

But if you have looked at curves over tax rates and curves over income inequality, I think it'd be hard to argue that "trickle down" has every worked or ever will.

Tax rates per income over year since 1913: https://qz.com/74271/income-tax-rates-since-1913/

What's happened since the 80s: http://www.npr.org/sections/money/2015/02/11/384988128/the-f...

Higher wages drive prices up, and price out less productive workers. Sure, the people who remain employed are better off. But what about everyone who has to pay higher prices, and workers who are now unable to find a job?

Why is it ok to tax profitable businesses/people for the sake of equality? I get it if they don't earn their profits fairly. Why should we steal from top producers and redistribute? Taxes should not be a means to redistribute wealth. It should be directly tied to whatever they are funding. More importantly, people should be free to chose what to spend their earnings on. Does the government own the people it governs? Does it have a claim in what people chose to produce? Having income tax forces everyone to pay for things they might not want (like a wall).

> Taxes should not be a means to redistribute wealth.

Isn't that more or less impossible? The whole point of a tax is that you take money from the broader population and spend it on something (a war, a road, libraries, public transit, food stamps, etc) that benefits only a subset of that population.

Taxation is, by definition, wealth redistribution.

Furthermore,

> Why is it ok to tax profitable businesses/people for the sake of equality?

This is a common misconception. Businesses don't pay taxes, people do. I don't mean " Apple doesn't pay it's fair share". I mean that the burden of the tax falls on the shareholders/owners of a business, even if the business is remitting the money. So, at the end of the day the question is not do we tax business versus individuals but rather a class issue: do we tax shareholders (who earn income from capital) versus labour (that is, people who earn their income through wages/salary).

I absolutely agree with you. Taxation is, by definition, wealth redistribution..and theft by people in power!

I think the more important question is what are we spending taxes on? and why does it have to be decided by a bureaucratic monopoly that is above the law a.k.a. government? Shouldn't we have a choice in how we allocate our own resources? Is it not our own time and labor that we use to produce? Why does that belong to anyone else?

I'm not against helping others in need. But the important distinction is that is should be by choice not from coercion.

I don't think you understood what he was actually saying...

> I think the more important question is what are we spending taxes on? and why does it have to be decided by a bureaucratic monopoly that is above the law a.k.a. government?

This is what elections are for, but obviously they could be done better, and with more granularity of choice (more than two).

> Shouldn't we have a choice in how we allocate our own resources? Is it not our own time and labor that we use to produce? Why does that belong to anyone else?

The government IS you, and everyone else, and you (and everyone else) build your time and labor on a society and infrastructure built by common funds. Anarcho-liberalism is insanely naive and can never work.

Why is it stealing?

Didn't they earn their riches by taking advantage of a system that was put in place by everyone? When someone makes a fortune in a society they are benefiting from the society's trade laws, justice systems, military protection, financial systems, education systems, workforce laws, available workforce, etc.

If the society helps you earn a fortune, shouldn't you proportionally pay back the society for all the help they've given you? Even if you only get to directly enjoy 50% of the value you produce, you still have an incentive for more marginal gains and you will indirectly benefit from the other 50% because you will reinvest it in the society that helped you produce it in the first place.

I find it telling that GP hasn't responded to this counter argument. It seems like people/entities committed to the libertarian POV are stubbornly unwilling to acknowledge the extent to which their success was contingently enabled by pre-existing societal structures. It's the height of solipsism, refusing to see the historical context that led to your current situation, and it's exactly this solipsism as practiced by corporations and the mega-wealthy that has led to the crises of inequality and instability we face today.

A contract that we were born into without consent and no choice to be free of it? Sounds like slavery.

Slaves were given food and shelter for their labor. Sure, they didn't directly enjoy a majority of what they produced, but the marginal gains would benefit everyone else.

> Higher wages drive prices up, and price out less productive workers. Sure, the people who remain employed are better off. But what about everyone who has to pay higher prices, and workers who are now unable to find a job?

I don't know if you do or have ever owned a business (I do), and that is somehow clouding your judgement, but this is a very shortsighted view, and in no way universal truth. Sure, on day one you as a business owner have to pay more, but going forward, every other business has to as well, so your clientele if it's end consumers (employees of other companies) will be richer, and if your clients are businesses their clients (employees) are richer so your business in turn still increases. This is not a a long chain of logic.

> Why is it ok to tax profitable businesses/people for the sake of equality?

I don't understand the motivation behind your phrasing. Is your question literally; "Why is it ok to tax X?". Because the taxing would be on profitable businesses, unprofitable business, rich people, poor people. Taxes are about societal growth, upkeep and yes, to some extent equality, BECAUSE it promotes a healthier market.

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