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Comment by santiagobasulto | Hacker News Reader

Nobody is answering your question. Churches (cults, religion) all over the world are tax-exempted as a way to avoid "persecution". If a cult is taxed, then a particular government could persecute a particular cult by just raising their taxes. Imagine a government that is very strong on religion A, decides to raise taxes on religion B.

I'm not saying this is right or wrong. It even sounds a bit dated to me. But that's the underlying reason.

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This doesn't track, governments could do whatever they wanted. There's no magical ruleset for governments. They could tax just you if they wanted, or they could set up a set of reasonable and airtight laws taxing the churches fairly.

I don't really see your point.

This doesnt track. The US government cant write whatever laws they want. They are actually constrained by the powers granted by the states via the constitution and protected by the judiciary. A new law taxing churches they dont like would not survive.

> Churches (cults, religion) all over the world are tax-exempted

This doesn't track. What's considered "constitutional" in the US varies as the wind blows. Such a law would not survive today, but in 50 years' time, who can say?

It does not.

Interpretation can vary but thats not the same thing.

'can be considered "constitutional"' is a function of the persons interpretation. Is it not the case that whether a law passes is affected by the interpretations of 'can be considered "constitutional"' by the powers that can influence the outcome.

https://pluralistic.net/2023/03/25/consequentialism/#dotards...

> For many Constitutional law scholars, last years' Dobbs decision on abortion rights at the Supreme Court came as a dismaying shock, because it showed conclusively that conlaw wasn't a realm of ideologically consistent intellectual foment, but rather, a matter of politics.

> Writing for Credit Slips, the finance law scholar Adam Levitin admits to feeling a bit of schadenfreude in that moment. The "blue collar" law scholars in "grubby" banking and money fields have always treated the conlaw set as "slightly clueless toffs"

Whilst true, that doesn't negate my point.

In the US, I believe (and hope) that differentially taxing all religions except one would be found to violate the First Amendment prohibition on establishing a religion.

Right but these are rules set up and regulated by the US government. They didn't need to structure them that way in the beginning. Many countries don't.

Many countries go so far the other way that the government taxes the people and gives the money to the church.

Very true. The Netherlands never spent a single cent on the state religion so it completely collapsed when tithing dried up.

Meanwhile in Belgium the government gives money to the Catholic church so it is able to survive.

Heh makes it sound like the Catholics are entirely funded by Belgium ;)

It's honestly understandable in some of these countries, especially when you consider the deep interconnection many countries have with the church (take Rome as the quintessential example; how many of the tourist hotspots are just churches).

> Imagine a government that is very strong on religion A, decides to raise taxes on religion B.

Happens all day long, just a little different and that is by allowing "story A" to be declared a religion, but "story B" not.

In the United States, non-profit organizations are generally tax exempt, whether they are religious or not.

Not in the way churches are.

Generally yes they are. Churches and non profits are generally 501.3.C organizations and share the same tax regulations.

There are, of course different types of non-profit statuses but nothing special available to churches from a tax perspective.

I'm not sure I follow, how would it be possible to raise taxes on a specific religion?

By targeting their assets?!

It is extremely simple once you get out of the western secular, tolerant mindset.

Just a matter of tailoring the law in the right way. For example, if you want to hurt church X which has a large following among urban population, just increase taxes on noncommercial private buildings with seating capacity over 50 in areas where population density is over some number. And make allowance for exceptions, so you can claim the law doesn't discriminate, and it's their fault that they didn't get exception.

The fact that exception is impossible to get if people asking for it adhere to some creed is secondary. Even if they get it, the process can be made costly and painful to the point where they run out of money before.

Or you can go explicit in your intentions, and make a law targeting that particular faith by name. It has been done in the past, it is happening now. Look at middle-east for examples.

And you can go for categories too. Say you don't want any foreign religions popping up. Just raise taxes on all, and give exceptions or such to faiths that have over some number of citizen adherents. The possibilities are practically limitless once you accept that law is a tool.

For better or worse, the tax system is here for everyone. Why should religions be the only institutions immune to it? Everything you said happens in America, just change religion for nationality (sanctions) or race. I don't see why religion should be different. Moreover, religions persecution also happens in the USA, but by other means. Catholics have been persecuted in the past, the same happened against jews during a period, and more recently to islam. The idea of tax exemption only happens to benefit the well entrenched religions: evangelical churches, mormonism in Utah, the Catholic church. It also helps up and coming scams such as scientologists, who take advantage of the provisions of the law.

You’d target activities specific to a religion.

Can’t think of a great example here from a religious perspective.

But there’s an interesting new bill in Florida that cedes control of very specific railways to the Florida Department of Traffic which would only affect the Disney World monorail this is part of the Florida governors battle with Disney. You could probably find similar ways to target religious buildings, businesses and other activities.

https://www.wfla.com/news/politics/florida-senate-passes-tra...

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