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Comment by thedufer | Hacker News Reader

Consumption taxes are regressive, so this would shift a lot of tax burden from the rich to the poor.

True, though I wonder to what degree a per-person dividend (some sort of universal income) could offset the regressivity of consumption taxes.

That is, we go ahead and tax consumption of land, road space, emissions, extraction, etc and everyone receives the same monthly sum that is enough to cancel out the taxes paid by a person who uses a minimal share of resources.

(Though I'm not sure I'd consider police interactions as a source of consumption taxes as per the original poster.)

I don't think that scheme changes the progressive/regressive nature of a system at all because the incremental increases in wealth are regressive. You are basically setting up a charitable floor on a regressive system.

Consider the differences in tax rates under your system between someone making 200k and 2 million. And you will see near identical percentages (fractions of a percent difference) because the floor you set is a fraction of their earnings and they are being taxed evenly on all the rest.

So it is regressive between those income ranges, but progressive if you compare someone making 20k with 200k.

1. Rich people consume; some consume a lot. Not just individually; they have businesses that consume voraciously.

2. Tax credits can relieve regression in consumption taxing; small consumers can pay as little as nothing.

> Rich people consume; some consume a lot.

Rich people consume a lot absolutely and individually, not proportionately as compared to anyone else. Wealthy people do not spend their entire income every year on consumption, which is what probably 60% of Americans do.

It treats everyone equally. That is a good thing. Progressive taxes are a sham to make more people ok with income taxes and collect more in taxes. It is a win-win for the IRS.

I support progressive taxes and that is not my motivation or reasoning at all.

It is a recognition of an increased share of discretionary income and the diminishing returns of higher incomes on quality of life.

We have to fund the government services, so it makes sense in my mind to do it with discretionary income and income that has diminishing returns in the quality of the life of the taxpayer. It is solid public policy IMO.

Second, the terminology is strange, because everyone is treated equally. No matter your race, sex, age, you are progressively taxed more based on your actions/earnings for the year. [Outside of carveouts for all the various tax credits and deductions, but within those carveouts it is equally progressive.]

It does not, unless you define "equally" in a very particular way. Under consumption-based tax schemes, poor people spend a larger portion of their income on taxes than rich people (because they spend more of their income, and consumption taxes are a tax on spending).

I'm not sure what you mean when you say that progressive taxes are a sham. The goal of taxing rich people at a higher rate than poor people seems pretty obviously good. Maybe the implementation issues wherein unrealized capital gains aren't captured? But that's particular to our implementation of taxes, not to progressive taxes generally.

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