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Comment by scotty79 | Hacker News Reader

> per homeless person

Oh, I thought that by non-contributing you meant tax dodging millionaires that incentivise vast array of useless luxury services and extract undue rent from the populace through their various schemes.

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Your average unemployed homeless person is dodging enormous amounts of taxes simply by not having an income. Do you also complain about them or is your bitterness simply a result of envy?

You can't dodge something you don't owe. Homeless pay all taxes they owe. Mostly salea tax I imagine.

And they get $100k/year of services. Their life is still not particularly good, but mismanagement can burn even the largest resource pile.

Christ. At that point just hand them the 100k. The addicts will quickly end the public problem and those who just needed a starting seed will emerge anew with at least a van to live in .

The vast majority of wealthy people who are commonly accused of not "paying their fair share" and of dodging taxes are simply structuring their financial lives in ways that allow them to reduce their tax obligations. Very few are engaged in actual tax evasion and all the rest pay all the taxes they owe.

Structuring by moving their wealth to Bahamas which is indeed fully legal because they are the ones writing same laws (or golfing with the authors) - something the homeless cannot. So this legal trick allows them to fully enjoy their wealthy status locally while paying close to zero taxes. While supporting the Bahamas economy, yay I guess.

This reeks of being an outside observer. WA has no income tax, but has a sales taxes which homeless people are subjected to. The only taxes are from property which renters also don't pay. When people complain about the rent seekers it's from a place of empathy, not envy. The extraction of wealth done by them always has and always will be more negatively impactful than homeless folks.

Renters pay property taxes. I know I do.

You also pay for your landlord's vacations, and their food. And their drug and alcohol and gambling addictions.

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