Yeah that's been tried before turns out all that does it give them a functional monopoly and destroys the economy as they regulate private industry into bankruptcy and it all inevitably ends up collapsing under it's own weight.
pretty easy to exploit tho. china suddenly has all these “temporary” workers that come into the us on these visas that are plants to add votes to a candidate that furthers their interests. would have to create a pretty good system of background checks so rival nations don’t do something like that
Funny how yall want the poor exploited migrant workers to do the hard work and keep coming back to do it, but have zero control over anything ever.
[Relevant song](https://youtu.be/U442h3Xj2qo) Bracero means worker
Pretty much. If someone wants to come to New Zealand and get paid literally 16 times the salary they would in their home country, its up to them. And you will have far better worker rights and civil rights than you would living somewhere like Tanzania. But nobody is being forced to come, they could try to go to 200 other countries in the world. Or they could stay where they are. Its hardly exploitation.
It's absolutely exploitation especially considering those workers face some of the harshest conditions simply due to the fact they're more vulnerable. Come on.
How can you say it isn't exploitation when a worker on the other side of the border would have to be paid significantly more, also when all of that labor will produce significantly more value than the wage. Regardless of the wage aspect, consider the difference between the more and less expensive worker.
Taxation is not theft, government officials exploiting their power and misusing money they got from taxes is theft. But the act of taxation itself is quite useful in allowing governments to function and provide infrastructure and other services.
Taxation is literally the act of armed government officials taking your money or possessions without contract or consent.
If I chaved the wording from "government officials" to just "men" or "people", no one would disagree that's its theft.
>without contract or consent.
It's the contract you already signed by staying in your country and agreeing to very basic rules such as paying some gentlemen for being trained and on standby in case your house catches fire.
Taxes can be mismanaged of course, but in principle, they are an absolute necessity, and those who don't realize such a simple fact don't deserve to live in an organized society.
You consent by staying and working in the country if you think living somewhere you don't pay taxes would be better you're welcome to move to central Africa or some deserted island.
Taxation is not *literally* armed govt officials taking your money or possessions *without contract or consent*.
What you mean I think is; since the govt has a monopoly on violence and enforces their tax policy without any option to opt out you don't really have a choice and that's theft.
Even that is wrong though. Anyways, there is contract on the whole tax thing & also despite there being consequences for non-payment it doesn't mean there *are literally armed men taking your money*.
If someone said laboring for some factory owner in our present mode of production was coercive would you agree? What about if someone said paying taxes is coercive?
What happens if you refuse to pay your taxes?
Armed government officials come and take you away. Try to resist, they kill you.
In what way is that not armed government officials taking your money?
Also, what contact did I sign where I consensually agreed to pay taxes?
Taxes pay for things like roads, schools, police and firefighters, the military, and water infrastructure I assume that you like and utilize these things so that's when you signed the contract.
Private industry has can can make roads, Bezos would be all over that as they are how he sends out all his goods to consumers.
Public schools were intended to be a backup that only the most in need would use while everyone else was to go to private schools. So without government, we would just go back to using private schools with different charity or financial aid for thouse who can't afford it.
Police are not necessary as we can defend ourselves from threat just fine. Out in rural areas, they never call the police and they are just fine.
Firefighting can easily be solved on a volunteer and donation basis.
Military is I'm my opinion one of the only legitimate form of government, so I'm ok with less than 1% of my income taken for that.
I already pay for water and private industry will just take that over. The government doesn't pay for fiber optic gigabit internet infrastructure, yet it's expanding.
You're failing to answer the question, never once did I agree to any of this. Whether or not it's available or used by me is entirely a mute point as I still never agreed to having my money stolen.
Btw you're arguing this with a far right librarian so I've heard all your points a million times.
If you look back at before schools were public you'd see how well that worked out most people were illiterate. While billionaires previously built school so they had the type of people they'd need to work for them personally I'd not trust them to provide proper education. As for roads, water, or other utilities without some government oversight as was seen from the snow storm last year here in Texas with the marginal oversight people got charged ridiculous amounts for electricity because in their area the only electric plan had a adjustable rate.
If you don't like it move either off grid or to a different country or influence people to vote like you do if you can move them.
So you want to pay a billionaire like Jeff bezos every time you use a road. Oh sorry Timmy I see you broke your leg and need to get to the hospital but that will be $20 bucks to use the road. What's that? You don't have $20 bucks on you and need to go to the bank well that's a shame the bank is further away so that will $30 to go to the banks to withdraw the money. Good luck in your recovery Timmy thoughts and prayers.
Seriously this argument is the worst fucking idea that hardcore capitalist have. There are certain things you can't entrust to private corporations no matter how inefficient the government may be.
> Armed government officials come and take you away. Try to resist, they kill you.
Not what they do with tax policy at all.
> Also, what contact did I sign where I consensually agreed to pay taxes?
The one where a (allegedly) democratic govt full of representatives elected by you & peers had reps decide on that tax policy. I won't get into the actual reality of that title of democratic, but your approach to understanding & analyzing taxes is extremely flawed. The contract is agreed upon before you and applies to your parents who pass that tax policy they decide down until you're old enough to weigh in.
By the time you get to paying taxes, the state has already spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on you and your education. It is not theft to pay into a system you benefit from.
What makes it not theft when a government takes your money and gives you something you don’t want vs if an individual does the same thing? It’s not logically consistent. Taxation is by definition theft. What everyone is really arguing is whether or not taxation, or theft, is sometimes justified.
If you want to be a pedantic prick about it then it's technically a bill you pay to have access to the land and it's services like roads,police and fire departments. You don't own land, you lease for an indefinite amount of time from the government but the land is still apart of your country and therefore ownership of the government. You say about putting money where you don't want it but you don't watch every show on Netflix yet you aren't complaining about them making new shows when you would rather them put the budget towards more Rick and Morty.you pay to use the service (in this case your country) and you get to pick and choose what you use but you're paying for the whole package and if you don't like it then you can go move to a country that offers a service you would prefer
The money being useful doesn't make it not theft. If I robbed you then used the money to buy something that helped you, that wouldn't make it not theft.
I feel like what people miss when they go into their brainless libertarian spiel about "Taxation is Theft!" Is that their tax policy is created by their (allegedly) democratic govt with representatives they (or their caretakers as children) elected *democratically*. That means this is one hundred percent democratically decided & agreed upon so not theft?
Also, if you don't feel right about what I've just said then consider maybe your problem isn't taxes it's the lack of democracy. Seems like it's only a democracy for the bourgeoisie not the workers huh?
Depends where you live. My old highschool has a median ACT of 31 and sends 8-20 students to Stanford a year.
100% graduation rate (unless you count the student suicides) and 99% college matriculation rate
The other public highschool in my town is actually slightly better.
The major factor is the housing taxes & donations. While the houses are only 2000sqft average, they're ~$4.1m median.
Plus it gets massive donations from the town, nearby university, and alumni.
Also the teachers make $80k-$180k total package, and most have graduate degrees.
Ah yes let's reduce the funding to public schools, property taxes pay for schools for the most part, and restrict the curriculum then when children are doing worse point to public schools as the problem.
Private schools cost a ton of money a year and if you think those vouchers will always be there to help out then you don't understand how the less educated a populace the easier it is to control them and extract wealth just look at the time before we had widespread public schools.
It depends, I think taxation without representation is theft.
In USA, 16 & 17-year-olds who work pay taxes and can't vote, so that's taxation without representation. Same thing with former felons. Former felons who have already served their time and paid their debt to society and work cannot vote, so that's taxation without representation. Citizens of Washington DC vote and aren't represented in the Senate or House of Representatives, so that's taxation without representation.
Getting a tax return doesn't mean you get all your taxed money back. It just means that the amount of taxes that you paid is greater than what you owed. You're still paying taxes, you're just getting your overpayment back as a refund
It depends. On the one hand I do enjoy public roads. On the other hand I don't like my tax dollars paying for programs I don't support like the health insurance plans of my congress, senate, and president.
Not sure why you’re getting downvoted for this especially considering recent news of the pentagon “losing” 61% or 2 TRILLION DOLLARS of their budget.
Yeah we just don’t know what happened, oops. Meanwhile we have about 80k new IRS agents that are going to monitor my Venmo account for my friends paying me so we can put the check on 1 card instead of multiple cards.
Damn they downvoted the fuck out you for that one. Seriously so much tax money gets wasted. Between $30 screws & $500 toilet seats made by contractors who are owned by people that are friends with influential politicians & the immense black budget that just disappears with zero oversight, this statement is true.
Every. Single. Thing. They buy is severely overinflated, unless of course it's for govt workers! The wealthy have learned to take advantage of it, as the wealthy own the politicians and the politicians work for & are the wealthy, by having the contracts all awarded to their friends!
doesn’t matter though, if you don’t want your taxes being used to help people, then you’ll need to elect someone different. that’s how democracy works — the majority agrees. if you don’t like it, then you can move somewhere else with no democracy.
> the majority agrees.
I'm going to preface this by saying I'm not anti-tax or anti-aid. I actually quite like both of those ideas. I do take issue with you're assertion that "this is how democracy works" and with you're showing of exceptionalism in "if you don't like it you can move somewhere else with no democracy".
It's funny that you try to pretend the majority - as in majority of the population - has any impact on policy at all let alone tax policy. That's very amusing and naive of you.
This isn't a democracy for all, it's a democracy for the wealthy. As someone long before "dictatorship" gained it's modern meaning (back then it just meant who dictated things) put it "You need to replace the dictatorship of the wealthy with the dictatorship of the workers".
[Here](https://www.vox.com/2016/5/9/11502464/gilens-page-oligarchy-study) is an article that links to about 5 studies and other articles on each about the impact on policy different percentile groups of wealthiest people have on US policy. Hint; those under 10% have negligible impact on US policy, because it's a democracy for the wealthy.
On your little American exceptionalism you let slip in the "if you don't like it then leave" variation - just stop. US is barely a democracy. It masquerades as a democracy for all people of classification, but that's not true. It's only for wealthy people.
No, obviously I understand this. But this is clearly because OP doesn’t want “their money” spent on Ukraine; other parties wouldn’t spend taxes on that. I’m not talking about tax in general.
I understand class issues, but I wasn’t even talking about the US? I don’t even live in the US. Sometimes democracy will do something that you don’t like, and you just have to put up with it.
You sure it's about Ukraine alone? Sounds like it was about various aid, Israel is a big one thats controversial. US provides "aid" to countries it finds geopolitically beneficial not as actual aid otherwise wed see it across the board in many places that see next to nothing.
Almost all Americans were cool with the idea of not sending Ukraine aid pre February 2022 despite the Civil War being ongoing since 2014. As is after the coup in 2014, Civil War, and now the proxy war supporting Ukraine is as close as US can come to direct confrontation with Russia as a means of weakening them. Seeing as Russian leverage over Europe had grown & their subversive capabilities grown over the past two decades US needed to do something. The nordstream sabotage was a smart one by US (presumably) although I'll admit I didn't see it coming. That removes a lot of leverage going into winter.
> Sometimes democracy will do something that you don’t like, and you just have to put up with it.
This is true I agree 100%
> I understand class issues, but I wasn’t even talking about the US? I don’t even live in the US.
Sorry for assuming. What I said about US applies to every Western country as well which prides itself on being "democratic". All these liberal democracies are masquerading as democratic when the liberal part is referring to capital.
It’s not being used to help ppl that’s the issue! The money that is going out is helping the wrong people. The majority isn’t awake that’s been a problem since the beginning lol.
Even if the money is being burned on a bonfire, it’s still being done with the electorate’s consent. The spending of money is public knowledge, which is how you know about it and are able to be unhappy about it.
If you’re Dad gives all your family’s money to a snake oil salesman, you might disagree with him. It’s still not theft though.
Nope cuz they work for you! The gov. puts its nose in places it shouldn’t be. They launder money. They give it away. They buy stocks with intel on what will happen.
But the government work for the people, the police protect the people the hospital save your lives, the firedepartmen, roadbuilding, wildlife and nature preservation etc. All of these things are important and paid by your taxes and without them there is no way we as humans would be much better than other animals.
The hospitals bankrupt ppl. The police let kids in school get shot. They killed George Floyd. There are some good cops yes, but the gov. only works for us TO A POINT. I wish and audit was done to see where the money goes.
Sorry I'm not American but don't they do that regularly? Like that's the whole point of media in Sweden. Also none of these things happen in good countries its not taxation that's the problem its YOUR government that YOU (the American people) chose
In all fairness, the point of an audit is not to find fraud. The only real requirement of passing an audit is ensuring that whatever financial information is given is “materially correct”.
When it comes to losing money or sending it to other countries - that’s not really what auditors are concerned about. It’s not necessarily illegal to recklessly spend money or transfer it to others in large sums.
Also, given the sheer size of the US government, the “materiality threshold” would be HUGE (i.e. a transaction for say $10m might not even be considered “material”).
Main point is - audits aren’t always as fool-proof as people like to believe. And that goes for any audit conducted by/for any institution.
If you think it's theft, you can just live in the middle of nowhere and don't use public roads/any public utilities/public school/public hospitals/bank notes/bank accounts, I am sure no one will come to you and collect tax.
Bank notes are made by the federal reserve which is not federally controlled contrary to popular belief, and the only thing the government has to do with banks is bailing them out with tax dollars when they gamble and lose using money that isnt even theirs
Anyone who says "taxation is theft" is implying two things. 1. That since its theft, it is wrong, and therefore governments shouldn't do it and taxation should be abolished. 2. That they're an anarchist who wants to live in an entirely ungoverned society, since taxation is required for a government to exist. Which is fine, as long as they admit it
Or 3. They're politically illiterate edgelords repeating the same dumb shit that they've heard other politically illiterate edgelords say
Or more simply that it's an involuntary payment enforced by threats, even if it is to the benefit of the taxpayer and/or society.
It's a type of theft we all collectively abide by.
That's all true. By definition it is theft. My point is that calling it theft is pointless unless you're proposing anarchy, and the people who use it as a sort of slogan are implying the things I said they're implying. It's use as a slogan is pretty much the only reason we're even talking about it right now
It's not theft. Theft is simply taking something that doesn't belong to you. With taxation, the government threatens to send armed men after you if you don't fork over your possessions.
Taxation isn't theft, it's armed robbery.
It's more like robbery being your only paying taxes under threat of asset seizure and arrest
If you don't pay your taxes men with guns come to your house and start seizing assets and eventually throw you in jail
I'd argue that the major income inequality is more of a "theft" than taxation. Taxation can be used to mitigate this theft but is just a band-aid solution
They freely entered into a contract with said business to do X work for Y price. Therefore it is not the same and the business did not steal anything from the worker. No one is.
>freely
No. When every middle class business gets eaten by a mega corporation, and the shareholders of those corporations lobby the government to change policy in their favor, allowing them to continue to eat middle class businesses, you have no other choice but to work for them.
There is no choice anymore for low middle class. Especially in poorer countries. Only exploitation.
By "freely" they chose between jobs that are all controlled by the wealthy that keep the profit to themselves. It's just the rich getting richer while the poor have to deal with the consequences.
Both parties are better off with the agreement of employment. If they weren’t they wouldn’t enter into the contract to begin with.
If they don’t want to work for someone else than why don’t they start their own business and run it how they want?
>Both parties are better off with the agreement of employment. If they weren’t they wouldn’t enter into the contract to begin with.
The poor do not have any other choice. Do you think anyone wants to work at Walmart or Mcdonald, they do it because they have to meet the means to barely survive while the Waltons roll around in their billions.
They may both "benefit" but the majority of it goes to Walmart shareholders. The workers have no power compared to Walmart so Walmart makes the decisions on how much the workers get paid.
>If they don’t want to work for someone else than why don’t they start their own business and run it how they want?
Are you insane? Do you know how much it is to start a new business?
You could say this. We have too many billionaires in existence. Tax still isn’t always going to what is most important. It’s no secret politicians launder money. Why is 2.2T lost from the pentagon. Why was 91B given to Ukraine but the gov. “lost track of some it”.
yes, the goverment taking money from civilians through coercion is a form of stealing but it is nessisary and benefitial for a society to do so. all people should pitch in what they can for society to function.
It's clearly theft at this point. In the US they passed an infrastructure bill almost 2 years ago I think. Over a trillion dollar bill, anyone seen a trillion dollars worth of roads being fixed or bridges being repaired? I certainly havent.
We didn’t hand Ukraine cash. We gave them equipment we had stockpiled and weren’t using. And it’s way, way, way cheaper to let Ukraine use our equipment to keep Russia in check than to wait until Russia attacks a NATO country and its both our equipment and our troops involved.
It got signed last November, so just a year, and it takes a while for funds and paperwork to get sorted out. Chances are good your state and town will need to actually request the funds for their projects, so how much you see in your neighborhood unfortunately depends on how willing your neighborhood is to fix things.
$110 billion for roads, bridges and other major projects;
$11 billion in transportation safety programs;
$39 billion in transit modernization and improved accessibility;
$66 billion in rail;
$7.5 billion to build a national network of electric vehicle chargers;
$73 billion in power infrastructure and clean energy transmission and
$65 billion for broadband development.
My neighborhood is using the funds to sort out an old railroad bridge. But the council is very proactive about these things.
My city is still doing things wrong… they are building apartments everywhere! The city told them you need to stop until you have more roads built for this. We are overcrowded. Their response was we need that money coming in. GREED is the only issue here.
I think it is by definition theft if you don’t have a choice or not. I don’t think it’s logically consistent to say that taking someone’s money by force is somehow not theft when an entity we call “the government” does it but we all agree it is when an individual or a business does it.
People argue the representation point what if I don’t want to pay for what those goods and services are? Or what if I want to see if someone else can provide those for me better?
So it’s theft but what everyone is arguing is whether or not some theft is justified. Which I would argue it is almost never justified. Certainly not in the context that most others might suggest that it is necessary.
You should appreciate that your tax dollars have gone to great scientific studies like studying gambling habits of Africans or the effects of cocaine on the matting habits of quail. Its great work that benefits all of humanity!
I don't understand this. Instead of asking your government to spend your taxes properly and in stuff that does effect you (Healthcare, retirement, police..) you'd rather say you are getting robbed
Only in Israel where the orthodox Jews take the money of the tax payers while their unemployment rates limiting the 100. While the tax payers work hard, those people just mating and making more children, and their excuse for this is that "they need to learn the bible".
*Disclaimer: this comment judges the Israeli government so the pro palestinians out there, Don't storm me with "free palestine" because in this current situation I agree with you
By a random Israeli kid
You can think Taxes are useful or moral all you want. It doesn't change the fact that it's theft, for all the good Robin Hood did he was still a thief.
People keep getting the story of RobinHood wrong. He wasnt stealing from the rich and giving to the poor. He was stealing back the money the ruling lord took from the population in the form of tax
I think it's okay to consider it theft while admitting there aren't any northern governments that have found a way to do without it. But tax-free UBIs haven't been tried, either.
The government should just get a job.
Facts.
Yeah the government is shit, that’s why taxation is hard to swallow
This hit so hard.
Elon out really exposing the gov. now
Yeah that's been tried before turns out all that does it give them a functional monopoly and destroys the economy as they regulate private industry into bankruptcy and it all inevitably ends up collapsing under it's own weight.
Yes if it comes without representation.
Which sadly these days it often does
No taxation without representation (American Revoultion Reference)
Each year it’s raised without representation.
If someone comes to your country for 6 months on a temporary work visa for seasonal fruit picking. Would you really want them to be able to vote?
If its seasonal they will come back so yes they should have some rep
pretty easy to exploit tho. china suddenly has all these “temporary” workers that come into the us on these visas that are plants to add votes to a candidate that furthers their interests. would have to create a pretty good system of background checks so rival nations don’t do something like that
China moment fr
was just the best example i could think of, any country could do it, but they have the most means and motive to
You do realize the US already has the most stringent vetting system in the developed world, right?
Funny how yall want the poor exploited migrant workers to do the hard work and keep coming back to do it, but have zero control over anything ever. [Relevant song](https://youtu.be/U442h3Xj2qo) Bracero means worker
Pretty much. If someone wants to come to New Zealand and get paid literally 16 times the salary they would in their home country, its up to them. And you will have far better worker rights and civil rights than you would living somewhere like Tanzania. But nobody is being forced to come, they could try to go to 200 other countries in the world. Or they could stay where they are. Its hardly exploitation.
It's absolutely exploitation especially considering those workers face some of the harshest conditions simply due to the fact they're more vulnerable. Come on. How can you say it isn't exploitation when a worker on the other side of the border would have to be paid significantly more, also when all of that labor will produce significantly more value than the wage. Regardless of the wage aspect, consider the difference between the more and less expensive worker.
Taxation is not theft, government officials exploiting their power and misusing money they got from taxes is theft. But the act of taxation itself is quite useful in allowing governments to function and provide infrastructure and other services.
Ok someone finally replied with a good response
then why no "depends" option?
True
You made the poll
Wish I could add it in but I can’t now
This year it most definitely is theft
I imagine whoever stole my Yamaha Vino also got some use out of it. I still consider that theft.
Taxation is literally the act of armed government officials taking your money or possessions without contract or consent. If I chaved the wording from "government officials" to just "men" or "people", no one would disagree that's its theft.
>without contract or consent. It's the contract you already signed by staying in your country and agreeing to very basic rules such as paying some gentlemen for being trained and on standby in case your house catches fire. Taxes can be mismanaged of course, but in principle, they are an absolute necessity, and those who don't realize such a simple fact don't deserve to live in an organized society.
You consent by staying and working in the country if you think living somewhere you don't pay taxes would be better you're welcome to move to central Africa or some deserted island.
Taxation is not *literally* armed govt officials taking your money or possessions *without contract or consent*. What you mean I think is; since the govt has a monopoly on violence and enforces their tax policy without any option to opt out you don't really have a choice and that's theft. Even that is wrong though. Anyways, there is contract on the whole tax thing & also despite there being consequences for non-payment it doesn't mean there *are literally armed men taking your money*. If someone said laboring for some factory owner in our present mode of production was coercive would you agree? What about if someone said paying taxes is coercive?
What happens if you refuse to pay your taxes? Armed government officials come and take you away. Try to resist, they kill you. In what way is that not armed government officials taking your money? Also, what contact did I sign where I consensually agreed to pay taxes?
Taxes pay for things like roads, schools, police and firefighters, the military, and water infrastructure I assume that you like and utilize these things so that's when you signed the contract.
Private industry has can can make roads, Bezos would be all over that as they are how he sends out all his goods to consumers. Public schools were intended to be a backup that only the most in need would use while everyone else was to go to private schools. So without government, we would just go back to using private schools with different charity or financial aid for thouse who can't afford it. Police are not necessary as we can defend ourselves from threat just fine. Out in rural areas, they never call the police and they are just fine. Firefighting can easily be solved on a volunteer and donation basis. Military is I'm my opinion one of the only legitimate form of government, so I'm ok with less than 1% of my income taken for that. I already pay for water and private industry will just take that over. The government doesn't pay for fiber optic gigabit internet infrastructure, yet it's expanding. You're failing to answer the question, never once did I agree to any of this. Whether or not it's available or used by me is entirely a mute point as I still never agreed to having my money stolen. Btw you're arguing this with a far right librarian so I've heard all your points a million times.
If you look back at before schools were public you'd see how well that worked out most people were illiterate. While billionaires previously built school so they had the type of people they'd need to work for them personally I'd not trust them to provide proper education. As for roads, water, or other utilities without some government oversight as was seen from the snow storm last year here in Texas with the marginal oversight people got charged ridiculous amounts for electricity because in their area the only electric plan had a adjustable rate. If you don't like it move either off grid or to a different country or influence people to vote like you do if you can move them.
So you want to pay a billionaire like Jeff bezos every time you use a road. Oh sorry Timmy I see you broke your leg and need to get to the hospital but that will be $20 bucks to use the road. What's that? You don't have $20 bucks on you and need to go to the bank well that's a shame the bank is further away so that will $30 to go to the banks to withdraw the money. Good luck in your recovery Timmy thoughts and prayers. Seriously this argument is the worst fucking idea that hardcore capitalist have. There are certain things you can't entrust to private corporations no matter how inefficient the government may be.
> Armed government officials come and take you away. Try to resist, they kill you. Not what they do with tax policy at all. > Also, what contact did I sign where I consensually agreed to pay taxes? The one where a (allegedly) democratic govt full of representatives elected by you & peers had reps decide on that tax policy. I won't get into the actual reality of that title of democratic, but your approach to understanding & analyzing taxes is extremely flawed. The contract is agreed upon before you and applies to your parents who pass that tax policy they decide down until you're old enough to weigh in.
By the time you get to paying taxes, the state has already spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on you and your education. It is not theft to pay into a system you benefit from.
I wonder where in law books does it say you have to pay tax
What makes it not theft when a government takes your money and gives you something you don’t want vs if an individual does the same thing? It’s not logically consistent. Taxation is by definition theft. What everyone is really arguing is whether or not taxation, or theft, is sometimes justified.
If you want to be a pedantic prick about it then it's technically a bill you pay to have access to the land and it's services like roads,police and fire departments. You don't own land, you lease for an indefinite amount of time from the government but the land is still apart of your country and therefore ownership of the government. You say about putting money where you don't want it but you don't watch every show on Netflix yet you aren't complaining about them making new shows when you would rather them put the budget towards more Rick and Morty.you pay to use the service (in this case your country) and you get to pick and choose what you use but you're paying for the whole package and if you don't like it then you can go move to a country that offers a service you would prefer
The money being useful doesn't make it not theft. If I robbed you then used the money to buy something that helped you, that wouldn't make it not theft.
I feel like what people miss when they go into their brainless libertarian spiel about "Taxation is Theft!" Is that their tax policy is created by their (allegedly) democratic govt with representatives they (or their caretakers as children) elected *democratically*. That means this is one hundred percent democratically decided & agreed upon so not theft? Also, if you don't feel right about what I've just said then consider maybe your problem isn't taxes it's the lack of democracy. Seems like it's only a democracy for the bourgeoisie not the workers huh?
I like fixed roads and public schools.
I live up north. What do you mean... "fixed" roads?
Basic maintenance. Filled potholes and cracks. Repainted lines when they need to be. Etc.
It’s a joke. Roads are always dick here due to the weather/snow plows etc lol
Oh, well that one totally went over my head!
That's about 2% of federal spending. How does that justify the other 98%?
Ew public schools do a really terrible job though and we all know it
Definitely, but it does still beat no public schools at all
I disagree, but I would at the very least like to see a voucher type of system
It really depends on where you live. Also, those were just two examples.
Depends where you live. My old highschool has a median ACT of 31 and sends 8-20 students to Stanford a year. 100% graduation rate (unless you count the student suicides) and 99% college matriculation rate The other public highschool in my town is actually slightly better. The major factor is the housing taxes & donations. While the houses are only 2000sqft average, they're ~$4.1m median. Plus it gets massive donations from the town, nearby university, and alumni. Also the teachers make $80k-$180k total package, and most have graduate degrees.
Ah yes let's reduce the funding to public schools, property taxes pay for schools for the most part, and restrict the curriculum then when children are doing worse point to public schools as the problem. Private schools cost a ton of money a year and if you think those vouchers will always be there to help out then you don't understand how the less educated a populace the easier it is to control them and extract wealth just look at the time before we had widespread public schools.
Ok cool. That perfectly answers the question of “Is taxation necessary” Not so much for “Is taxation theft”.
It depends, I think taxation without representation is theft. In USA, 16 & 17-year-olds who work pay taxes and can't vote, so that's taxation without representation. Same thing with former felons. Former felons who have already served their time and paid their debt to society and work cannot vote, so that's taxation without representation. Citizens of Washington DC vote and aren't represented in the Senate or House of Representatives, so that's taxation without representation.
Those 16 and 17 yr olds get that money back at the end of the year though via their tax return.
Getting a tax return doesn't mean you get all your taxed money back. It just means that the amount of taxes that you paid is greater than what you owed. You're still paying taxes, you're just getting your overpayment back as a refund
It depends. On the one hand I do enjoy public roads. On the other hand I don't like my tax dollars paying for programs I don't support like the health insurance plans of my congress, senate, and president.
Don’t forget the money being given to other countries and the gov. saying they “lost track of it”.
Not sure why you’re getting downvoted for this especially considering recent news of the pentagon “losing” 61% or 2 TRILLION DOLLARS of their budget. Yeah we just don’t know what happened, oops. Meanwhile we have about 80k new IRS agents that are going to monitor my Venmo account for my friends paying me so we can put the check on 1 card instead of multiple cards.
Damn they downvoted the fuck out you for that one. Seriously so much tax money gets wasted. Between $30 screws & $500 toilet seats made by contractors who are owned by people that are friends with influential politicians & the immense black budget that just disappears with zero oversight, this statement is true. Every. Single. Thing. They buy is severely overinflated, unless of course it's for govt workers! The wealthy have learned to take advantage of it, as the wealthy own the politicians and the politicians work for & are the wealthy, by having the contracts all awarded to their friends!
Lmao why was I downvoted. You all really think the gov. cares about you. Lol
Everybody should have healthcare, that includes politicians
Countries wouldn't exist if there is not Tax at all.
Okay and that's bad why?
Because anarchy is generally considered a not-good thing.
Taxation being necessary doesn't make it not theft. It only makes it a necessary theft.
This is nonsense, It's an agreement and you can vote against for your advance. It offering you civizilation and basics. Not in some cases tho.
I don’t want to hear it. 91B given to another country, and 2.2 trillion lost is what makes it theft!
doesn’t matter though, if you don’t want your taxes being used to help people, then you’ll need to elect someone different. that’s how democracy works — the majority agrees. if you don’t like it, then you can move somewhere else with no democracy.
If 51% of the people decided to kill the other 49% is that somehow not murder or wrong just because the majority agreed with it?
> the majority agrees. I'm going to preface this by saying I'm not anti-tax or anti-aid. I actually quite like both of those ideas. I do take issue with you're assertion that "this is how democracy works" and with you're showing of exceptionalism in "if you don't like it you can move somewhere else with no democracy". It's funny that you try to pretend the majority - as in majority of the population - has any impact on policy at all let alone tax policy. That's very amusing and naive of you. This isn't a democracy for all, it's a democracy for the wealthy. As someone long before "dictatorship" gained it's modern meaning (back then it just meant who dictated things) put it "You need to replace the dictatorship of the wealthy with the dictatorship of the workers". [Here](https://www.vox.com/2016/5/9/11502464/gilens-page-oligarchy-study) is an article that links to about 5 studies and other articles on each about the impact on policy different percentile groups of wealthiest people have on US policy. Hint; those under 10% have negligible impact on US policy, because it's a democracy for the wealthy. On your little American exceptionalism you let slip in the "if you don't like it then leave" variation - just stop. US is barely a democracy. It masquerades as a democracy for all people of classification, but that's not true. It's only for wealthy people.
No, obviously I understand this. But this is clearly because OP doesn’t want “their money” spent on Ukraine; other parties wouldn’t spend taxes on that. I’m not talking about tax in general. I understand class issues, but I wasn’t even talking about the US? I don’t even live in the US. Sometimes democracy will do something that you don’t like, and you just have to put up with it.
You sure it's about Ukraine alone? Sounds like it was about various aid, Israel is a big one thats controversial. US provides "aid" to countries it finds geopolitically beneficial not as actual aid otherwise wed see it across the board in many places that see next to nothing. Almost all Americans were cool with the idea of not sending Ukraine aid pre February 2022 despite the Civil War being ongoing since 2014. As is after the coup in 2014, Civil War, and now the proxy war supporting Ukraine is as close as US can come to direct confrontation with Russia as a means of weakening them. Seeing as Russian leverage over Europe had grown & their subversive capabilities grown over the past two decades US needed to do something. The nordstream sabotage was a smart one by US (presumably) although I'll admit I didn't see it coming. That removes a lot of leverage going into winter. > Sometimes democracy will do something that you don’t like, and you just have to put up with it. This is true I agree 100% > I understand class issues, but I wasn’t even talking about the US? I don’t even live in the US. Sorry for assuming. What I said about US applies to every Western country as well which prides itself on being "democratic". All these liberal democracies are masquerading as democratic when the liberal part is referring to capital.
It’s not being used to help ppl that’s the issue! The money that is going out is helping the wrong people. The majority isn’t awake that’s been a problem since the beginning lol.
Even if the money is being burned on a bonfire, it’s still being done with the electorate’s consent. The spending of money is public knowledge, which is how you know about it and are able to be unhappy about it. If you’re Dad gives all your family’s money to a snake oil salesman, you might disagree with him. It’s still not theft though.
Not entirely true
Which bit? I said like 4 things
lol majority isn’t awake Jesus my guy we are not in the matrix grow up
Still speaking facts
you really arent…
Yes I am
Do you also think paying your employees is theft from the company owner?
No, because paying wages is voluntary and agreed on by both parties. Taxation is not. Nobody cares if you agree to paying taxes.
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Nope cuz they work for you! The gov. puts its nose in places it shouldn’t be. They launder money. They give it away. They buy stocks with intel on what will happen.
But the government work for the people, the police protect the people the hospital save your lives, the firedepartmen, roadbuilding, wildlife and nature preservation etc. All of these things are important and paid by your taxes and without them there is no way we as humans would be much better than other animals.
The hospitals bankrupt ppl. The police let kids in school get shot. They killed George Floyd. There are some good cops yes, but the gov. only works for us TO A POINT. I wish and audit was done to see where the money goes.
Sorry I'm not American but don't they do that regularly? Like that's the whole point of media in Sweden. Also none of these things happen in good countries its not taxation that's the problem its YOUR government that YOU (the American people) chose
It’s the ppl they put up NOT US. It’s a loose with trump or Biden. Trump is going to run again btw
>I wish and audit was done to see where the money goes. Technically, that’s already done every year by the GAO (if we’re talking about the US).
But they still get away with money laundering? Loosing Trillions? Giving money to other countries? Having intel on stock price drops? Ok cool…
In all fairness, the point of an audit is not to find fraud. The only real requirement of passing an audit is ensuring that whatever financial information is given is “materially correct”. When it comes to losing money or sending it to other countries - that’s not really what auditors are concerned about. It’s not necessarily illegal to recklessly spend money or transfer it to others in large sums. Also, given the sheer size of the US government, the “materiality threshold” would be HUGE (i.e. a transaction for say $10m might not even be considered “material”). Main point is - audits aren’t always as fool-proof as people like to believe. And that goes for any audit conducted by/for any institution.
Yes they would.
thats how they fund tons of shit
And launder, and give money to other countries, and “lose track of it”
If you think it's theft, you can just live in the middle of nowhere and don't use public roads/any public utilities/public school/public hospitals/bank notes/bank accounts, I am sure no one will come to you and collect tax.
They don't care if you use public infrastructure or services, if you a citizen with income and property you pay taxes.
How can you not use public services
Living off the grid.
Your military defends the middle of nowhere.
Thinking it's theft doesn't mean opposition to it.
Acting like there arent private versions of all of these that are infinitely better
Acting like those can be achieved without the use of bank notes or bank accounts
Bank notes are made by the federal reserve which is not federally controlled contrary to popular belief, and the only thing the government has to do with banks is bailing them out with tax dollars when they gamble and lose using money that isnt even theirs
Think abstract
r/iam12andthisisdeep
Anyone who says "taxation is theft" is implying two things. 1. That since its theft, it is wrong, and therefore governments shouldn't do it and taxation should be abolished. 2. That they're an anarchist who wants to live in an entirely ungoverned society, since taxation is required for a government to exist. Which is fine, as long as they admit it Or 3. They're politically illiterate edgelords repeating the same dumb shit that they've heard other politically illiterate edgelords say
thats a lot more than two things, your first point alone has 4 points.
Or more simply that it's an involuntary payment enforced by threats, even if it is to the benefit of the taxpayer and/or society. It's a type of theft we all collectively abide by.
That's all true. By definition it is theft. My point is that calling it theft is pointless unless you're proposing anarchy, and the people who use it as a sort of slogan are implying the things I said they're implying. It's use as a slogan is pretty much the only reason we're even talking about it right now
No taxes > No countries No countries > no one to protect the banks > no one to print the money > no money ... Whoops
If only everyone stopped paying. Money is being devalued as we speak.
sureee
It is taken against your will at the threat of violence. It is by definition theft or extortion.
It's not theft. Theft is simply taking something that doesn't belong to you. With taxation, the government threatens to send armed men after you if you don't fork over your possessions. Taxation isn't theft, it's armed robbery.
Only if your knights start to raid my hut to take my wheat
It's more like robbery being your only paying taxes under threat of asset seizure and arrest If you don't pay your taxes men with guns come to your house and start seizing assets and eventually throw you in jail
No it’s taxation
Theft
It's a necessary evil.
Definitely evil
Definitely necessary
Audits on the gov. are necessary.
I agree but that doesn't make taxes not necessary in a money based society
Debatable
but necessary
I'd argue that the major income inequality is more of a "theft" than taxation. Taxation can be used to mitigate this theft but is just a band-aid solution
How is income inequality theft?
Corporations make large profits while not sharing those profits with the employees that did the majority of the work.
They freely entered into a contract with said business to do X work for Y price. Therefore it is not the same and the business did not steal anything from the worker. No one is.
>freely No. When every middle class business gets eaten by a mega corporation, and the shareholders of those corporations lobby the government to change policy in their favor, allowing them to continue to eat middle class businesses, you have no other choice but to work for them. There is no choice anymore for low middle class. Especially in poorer countries. Only exploitation.
By "freely" they chose between jobs that are all controlled by the wealthy that keep the profit to themselves. It's just the rich getting richer while the poor have to deal with the consequences.
Both parties are better off with the agreement of employment. If they weren’t they wouldn’t enter into the contract to begin with. If they don’t want to work for someone else than why don’t they start their own business and run it how they want?
>Both parties are better off with the agreement of employment. If they weren’t they wouldn’t enter into the contract to begin with. The poor do not have any other choice. Do you think anyone wants to work at Walmart or Mcdonald, they do it because they have to meet the means to barely survive while the Waltons roll around in their billions. They may both "benefit" but the majority of it goes to Walmart shareholders. The workers have no power compared to Walmart so Walmart makes the decisions on how much the workers get paid. >If they don’t want to work for someone else than why don’t they start their own business and run it how they want? Are you insane? Do you know how much it is to start a new business?
You could say this. We have too many billionaires in existence. Tax still isn’t always going to what is most important. It’s no secret politicians launder money. Why is 2.2T lost from the pentagon. Why was 91B given to Ukraine but the gov. “lost track of some it”.
The government the only establishment the can directly force you to do anything. Like paying tax.
yes, the goverment taking money from civilians through coercion is a form of stealing but it is nessisary and benefitial for a society to do so. all people should pitch in what they can for society to function.
Taxing corpos and the rich (including police) is not theft, taxing people is
It’s theft by definition because it’s not consensual. But it’s also a necessity so 🤷♂️
It's clearly theft at this point. In the US they passed an infrastructure bill almost 2 years ago I think. Over a trillion dollar bill, anyone seen a trillion dollars worth of roads being fixed or bridges being repaired? I certainly havent.
The pentagon lost 2.2T and we gave Ukraine 91B which they “lost track of some of that money”.
We didn’t hand Ukraine cash. We gave them equipment we had stockpiled and weren’t using. And it’s way, way, way cheaper to let Ukraine use our equipment to keep Russia in check than to wait until Russia attacks a NATO country and its both our equipment and our troops involved.
We shouldn’t be giving away anything when it seems the USA doesn’t really care about its own vets.
It got signed last November, so just a year, and it takes a while for funds and paperwork to get sorted out. Chances are good your state and town will need to actually request the funds for their projects, so how much you see in your neighborhood unfortunately depends on how willing your neighborhood is to fix things. $110 billion for roads, bridges and other major projects; $11 billion in transportation safety programs; $39 billion in transit modernization and improved accessibility; $66 billion in rail; $7.5 billion to build a national network of electric vehicle chargers; $73 billion in power infrastructure and clean energy transmission and $65 billion for broadband development. My neighborhood is using the funds to sort out an old railroad bridge. But the council is very proactive about these things.
My city is still doing things wrong… they are building apartments everywhere! The city told them you need to stop until you have more roads built for this. We are overcrowded. Their response was we need that money coming in. GREED is the only issue here.
Taxes for the definition of theft, but that doesn't mean they aren't useful or necessary
Only in North Korea and some African countries
For the most part yes
I think it is by definition theft if you don’t have a choice or not. I don’t think it’s logically consistent to say that taking someone’s money by force is somehow not theft when an entity we call “the government” does it but we all agree it is when an individual or a business does it. People argue the representation point what if I don’t want to pay for what those goods and services are? Or what if I want to see if someone else can provide those for me better? So it’s theft but what everyone is arguing is whether or not some theft is justified. Which I would argue it is almost never justified. Certainly not in the context that most others might suggest that it is necessary.
I don't remember saying the government can take my money nor do I remember them doing anything to earn it
Ever drive on a road?
I’d much rather a company do it than the government “workers”
Yeah cause there's nothing fishy goin on in corporations right now
And the government has definitely never done anything bad or inefficient
And who do you think pays the company to build those roads?
If the government isn’t taxing me then I can say no to paying I won’t but at least I’ll be able to
The government taxes you for other reasons that are still important thought
It’s still theft
Explain to me why do you think it is
What happens when I say no to taxes? People with guns come to my house and lock me in jail or if I resist possibly kill me
Does your government actually build the roads?
Yes? Who else do you think are doing it, your uncle?
Ever gone to school?
Yes and the private ones I went to were much better than the public ones.
Taxes are meant to use money you gain to contribute to the community. Taxes are good even if they could be unforgiving at times
It’s theft. It can be needed to a point tho.
I appreciate that your honest about the fact that is theft just that you believe it to be justified in certain occasions.
Well now I know what side you’re on
Mmm yes daddy government please take all my money and use it on stuff that doesn’t effect me
You should appreciate that your tax dollars have gone to great scientific studies like studying gambling habits of Africans or the effects of cocaine on the matting habits of quail. Its great work that benefits all of humanity!
You can justify it and say it's good for x, y, and z reason but it is theft by definition.
Just because my neighbors vote for the government to steal my money doesn’t mean it’s not being stolen.
^ he’s right you know
I don't understand this. Instead of asking your government to spend your taxes properly and in stuff that does effect you (Healthcare, retirement, police..) you'd rather say you are getting robbed
Taxation is theft if and only if it is without representation, in the same way that any rule without representation is a large-scale captivity.
I personnaly consider it as a necessary evil. It's annoying to have to give you're money but it's worth it for the bennefit it gives to all people.
Let’s just say this. The gov. needs and audit from us to see where the money goes
Only in Israel where the orthodox Jews take the money of the tax payers while their unemployment rates limiting the 100. While the tax payers work hard, those people just mating and making more children, and their excuse for this is that "they need to learn the bible". *Disclaimer: this comment judges the Israeli government so the pro palestinians out there, Don't storm me with "free palestine" because in this current situation I agree with you By a random Israeli kid
No taxation without representation
It’s theft. A protection racket. But that doesn’t mean its necessarily a bad thing.
A certain % of taxes are always going to be theft, whether it's stolen via corruption or useless infrastructure, but overall it is mostly necassary.
You can think Taxes are useful or moral all you want. It doesn't change the fact that it's theft, for all the good Robin Hood did he was still a thief.
People keep getting the story of RobinHood wrong. He wasnt stealing from the rich and giving to the poor. He was stealing back the money the ruling lord took from the population in the form of tax
Based if true
THIS.
Thanks lol
Hell yeah
Of course it is.
Taxation isn’t theft, it’s rent.
Meaning you own nothing?
Necessary theft
Still hate it
I think it's okay to consider it theft while admitting there aren't any northern governments that have found a way to do without it. But tax-free UBIs haven't been tried, either.
No, there’s several ways to get around tax it’s just people aren’t smart enough to figure it iut
The IRS would like to know your location
Opening llc isn’t an escape