Taxes are a good thing.
They pay, or should pay, for education, health, military, roads and infrastructure and a wide variety of other stuff that is good for everyone.
It puzzles me that people hate taxes so much.
They pay, or should pay, for education, health, military, roads and infrastructure and a wide variety of other stuff that is good for everyone.
It puzzles me that people hate taxes so much.
I know in many countries people are happy to pay taxes, if I saw everyone was treated well, got free healthcare and free universities I'd probably be happier about paying tax too.
How much do you think the Navy actually costs? Crunching the numbers, the tax the corporation I work at (admittedly, not a small company) is by itself sufficient to pay for running one of those carriers.
We don't need 355 deployable navy vessels. Improving education and health care of our citizens would do more to improve America's economic position than jostling for terrority in the Indian Ocean. Climate change is a bigger treat than terrorism.
It is important to note that the 25% for SS/MC is funded by a separate tax, targeted to those programs. Without getting sidetracked over budget unification, it is equally important to note that this separate tax has generated a surplus for decades, and has therefore been used to subsidize the rest of the budget.
The United States Federal Government is a heavily armed HR benefits company.
https://www.pgpf.org/budget-basics/budget-explainer-medicare
Edit: I think maybe you were reading a source describing "health care spending" including not only Medicare but also Medicaid, CHIP, health care for veterans, and possibly other categories of health expenditures. Which doesn't really take away from your point! TIL
During the Bush years, military spending was in the 25% (or greater) range.
SS/MC was lower (as a percentage of the budget) than today, but it was closer to 33% than 25%.
See e.g. https://www.thebalance.com/fy-2007-u-s-federal-budget-and-sp... which has links to other years.
People's problems with taxes typically fall into two buckets, sometimes both.
1. On a fundamental economics level, the Government is an inefficient third party spender: it spends other peoples money on services it doesn't utilize. There is no feedback loop there besides bureaucracy.
2. We actually have a pretty moderate tax burden already, mostly footed by the average US worker. Everyone talks about the top rate, or federal taxes, but we also have sales tax, property tax, estate tax, in some areas a county tax on top of city or municipality tax, and additional education-related taxes, not counting the outlier states that have even more taxes on top of that. (There's a saying in NYC: Every day is tax day). The common worker pays the majority of the taxes, and they are the ones who are most sensitive to any increase in taxes, and feel pinched already, so they naturally, and very expectedly are against being taxed more. (Realize that the typical HN'er is not the average US worker, making ~60k median salary with few benefits)
http://fortune.com/2019/02/04/support-for-tax-increase-on-we...
this would contradict your theory that "the common worker hates taxes", since most Americans want more taxation, not less.
If you hate taxes and love services, the obvious thing is to get someone else to pay for them.
See? Platitudes are easy.
Reducto ad adsurbium just lets anyone sit comfortably inside the edge of the boundary you've set. It's an extremely uncompelling form of argumentation.
No, not at all. Democracy means rule of the people, not rule of the strongest.
> Just because something is democratic, doesn't mean that it is unassailably good.
Of course not. But if something is not democratic, then it is definitely bad.
> Democracy is another name for mob rule
Doesnt matter. That ``mob`` has a right not to be ruled by someone else.
> and provides zero protection for minorities against the majority.
It does not provide electricity either.
> There is a reason we are a republic and not a democracy.
That is an accurate description of North Korea.
It’s like asking somebody if they want free stuff. Of course they say yes, it costs them nothing.
Ask the same question where their own taxes go up and see what the answer is.
Reminds me of the HN thread about the 2018 tax changes (limited SALT deduction). The same people who call for higher taxes (many of them in the top 5% income range) start complaining about their taxes going up.
Everyone is fine with higher taxes when it’s someone “richer” than they are.
OK, why don't you ask these same people if they think taxes should be raised on people poorer than them. Do you think 71% would agree with that also? Because that also costs these people nothing, right?
In other words I disagree with your assertion that Americans cannot tell, or care, for the difference between an under-taxed wealthy person and an over-burdened poor person.
> Reminds me of the HN thread about the 2018 tax changes (limited SALT deduction). The same people who call for higher taxes (many of them in the top 5% income range) start complaining about their taxes going up.
that is because property taxes vary wildly across different states due to policies of the local state governments governments and it amounts to punishment of states that have more comprehensive taxation and social services for their populations, in other words, have a larger number of Democratic voters. Taxation should not be distributed based on political affiliation. The states that have higher property taxes are less of a burden on the federal government since their populations are more educated, less desperately poor, and have better healthcare.
As you won't be surprised, I live in a SALT-sensitive state, but even people here who live below the poverty line in a house that was long ago paid for are being killed by their property taxes. They are poor people who are over-taxed and the recent changes made things worse. My taxes did not go up at all since my property taxes happen to be quite low in any case. However, I still oppose the changes in the SALT deduction, for the reasons above. So another anecdote of someone that can actually apply reasoning about the common good to a taxation question rather than caring only about myself paying more.
Your examples are great places to start. Is the military good for everyone? How have we been using it since WWII, and how has that worked out?
Is spending on roads good for everyone? Is the Interstate Highway System’s effect on the American lifestyle and built environment, on average, a positive one?
How is education funded? How is funding related to outcomes? Can you improve outcomes by spending more?
How closely does the political process track popular will? What considerations determine whether something gets funded and how much?
The world may be less puzzling (or at least, puzzling in different ways) when you become more familiar with the complexities and controversies in these questions.
I agree with that notion to a certain degree. For example, I wish there is a way to allocate the tax that I pay yearly to the programs that I want to fund. Specifically speaking, say if I pay $100 in tax, I should have a say to paying at least $50 of that to programs that I think are important for me (e.g., dept. of transportation; dept. of education; EPA...)
Which is the whole reason why individuals should not be making such choices. Small, marginalised causes or departments should still get funding.
If we followed your method of fund allocation, some aspects of Govt would not get any funding at all. You may also end up funding departments which don't need as much funding. This misallocation is worse than today's imo.
Isn't that what voting for representatives that represent your general viewpoints is meant to do? You delegate decisions to representatives because it wouldn't be practical to keep up with everything you need to make a large number of informed decisions.
I’m on the more conservative side of things, but I’m not opposed to taxes if they are efficiently spent.
I don't have a solution for a better system, but I can absolutely see why people do not like taxes. They aren't building the world I want to see.
I wouldn't classify taxes as "a good thing". I'd say it is a necessary evil or something that could be good in a limited form. If it truly was a good thing, then we should maximize the good and tax everyone at 100% and give all our income to the government.
Also, considering the poor state of our education system, healthcare, infrastructure and "wide variety of other stuff", arguments can be made that taxes aren't as good as people think. Toss in the neverending wars to justify military budgets, you could argue taxes are bad.
But I think most sensible people reject the good/bad extremes and take a moderate view. Some taxation are or can be good. It can also be wasteful and bad.
The idea is that rugged individuals should have absolute property rights, and that business will take care of things.