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Comment by gavanwoolery | Hacker News Reader

If you sell a company for $100 million, that's almost $9 million more down the drain. Yes, countries XYZ and have it worse, but that does not necessarily make this a good thing.

In general, tax hikes are bad, because the government caries little responsibility (look how reckless they have been with our budget/deficit to date). Giving more tax money to the govt. is like giving a loan to someone with a horrible credit score.

Also, this technology agenda is horrible. It is not the government's job gamble tax-payer money on business ventures (even ones as appealing as "green tech") - leave that to VCs and free markets.

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That's not $9M down the drain - it's $9M used to pay the US Government as your startup requires all the infrastructure, legal framework and military protection provided to get where it is (feel free to move your startup to Somalia, where I hear the taxes are close to zero).

That the investor/owner portion of the tax burden will go up slightly from historically low levels doesn't belie the fact that the average American and small business owner pays even more in %.

Remember - during the roaring 90s we had a much higher rate - did that stop the Googles, Yahoos, Akamais, etc?

All those things you listed that a start needs from the government, they only account for about 26% of the budget. So... $6.6M down the drain.

it's $9M used to pay the US Government as your startup requires all the infrastructure, legal framework and military protection provided to get where it is (feel free to move your startup to Somalia, where I hear the taxes are close to zero).

I think a few here would feel free to move their startups to -- Germany, with less than 1/3rd of the US' military expenses per capita [0] -- or Hong Kong, where mass transit is privatized [1] -- or Canada, where the number of lawyers per capita is 1/15th that of the US [2]. I dare say some have a positive view of all three of these statistics, despite them being technically "more Somalia-like". Not to say (not at all!) that militaries, infrastructure, and legal systems are useless and shouldn't be funded; but perhaps that they can be less funded (by taxpayers) with a net social benefit.

And that the statement "we should pay more to government agencies for the benefit of startups" is not immediately obvious.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_military_...

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MTR

[2] https://www.law.harvard.edu/programs/olin_center/papers/pdf/...

> I think a few here would feel free to move their startups to -- Germany, with less than 1/3rd of the US' military expenses per capita

Feel free to do so, as specified by another commenter - you'll end up paying about double to the German Government, then.

Good infrastructure and a fertile business market apparently requires taxes, apparently.

I'm not against any of those things - but we were doing just fine with a lower tax rate. Are these tax hikes going to build roads, buy bombs, or maybe just bail out some Wallstreet friends? Like I said, the government is the best place to invest our hard-earned salaries. Make them figure out how to properly budget money, then maybe allow them more. I'm not arguing to demolish our government, just keep it small. Would you rather give your money to someone who was motivated to do well, like a small business owner, or a lethargic beast like the government, who does not care what it's burn rate is?

I believe Somalia has the libertarian taxation policy that you are looking for. Be sure to pack some extra guns though.

There's also no capital gains tax in Hong Kong or Singapore and yet those places are not crime-ridden dysptopias. If you believe a higher level of taxation is necessary to support the services that you believe the government should offer then it would be much more constructive to provide some evidence of that rather than just being snarky.

Both are city states, they are hardly countries and much of their success is by proximity to countries where taxes aren't low (PRC, Malaysia).

Also, neither HK or Singapore are very cheap. You don't pay taxes, you just pay more. A car in Singapore, for example, is around $100K every 5 or 6 years.

I'm very tired of Americans complaining about taxes when they have one of the lowest tax burdens in the world along with the lowest cost of living based on value.

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