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Comment by tw04 | Hacker News Reader

> "Europe is taxing Americans to subsidize a continent held back by Europe’s own suffocating regulations," Carr said.

And America is taxing Americans via tariffs to subsidize a corrupt executive branch lining its own pockets. At least Europe is looking out for a whole continent. Not just a handful of grifters.

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Europe does tax its people a lot more. So the argument doesn't make sense.

Taxes which are used wisely for the people’s benefit is not a wasteful thing. That was the point original commentator made.

Your reasoning is that taxation is always bad and the more you pay the worst, a very American view which I can understand given how badly US government spends money in this regard.

I made no such reasoning. The parent comment wrote about taxes like its something bad.

It didn't just say tax, it suggested what the taxes were for, and how they were levied.

If we're all going to be persnickety about things, let's use the whole context.

Still doesn't make sense. How are tariffs "subsidising" corruption? What does that even mean?

It's just a dog whistle. People hate tax, so calling things that are not tax "tax" triggers anger in people without deep critical thinking skills. Or people with skills but not enough energy or time to use them on this particular issue.

Actually the difference isn't that big when you consider that "taxes" (I'm using this to describe all (semi-)mandatory state money extraction from revenues, whether they're called tax, insurance, cotisation, etc) in European countries cover the majority of healthcare and retirement costs that Americans pay out of pocket. But still have to pay. So if the US had the same "tax" model as European countries do, the rate wouldn't be that off (VAT is usually higher than American sales taxes, income tax often has higher brackets, but Americans spend a lot more on healthcare and retirement).

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