Would you accept a tax hike if it meant higher taxes on the rich?

You do see how silly you are being don't you? I can be in favor of a stop light sitting at the intersection of Main Street and Vine that lasts 90 seconds with a flow of 3 minutes between reds, and not believe that a brick wall standing there at that intersection will be even smarter.

The idea is that moderating traffic flow so that travel can do just that, with an accomodation for safety is a balance of values and priorities. It's the same with taxes. Now apply that idea of balancing disparate values and priorities so common in governance, to the tax code.

 

I think taxes should be equal percentages.

 

But of what? There's the rub.

 

Is that what you heard from mouthpieces for rich folks?

The "little people" gain more from government programs than they lose paying higher taxes.

 

Yeah, sure—minimum wage workers should pay the same percentage as someone making $200,000 per year.

 

Sounds great. Raise taxes on poor people who have a hard time keeping food on the table.

 

Very sad.

 

Or $200M...

How about everyone paying the same percent of their wealth? As it stands, the poor pay vastly larger percentages of their wealth in taxes -- often more than 100% -- than the rich (usually less than 1%).

"It is true governments cannot be supported without great charge, and it is fit every one who enjoys his share of the protection should pay out of his estate his proportion for the maintenance of it." -- John Locke

 

Wrong. While there are very few of them, they own pretty much everything. So while taxing a larger portion of their income won't pay for government, taxing a larger portion of their wealth certainly would. And that would be simple justice, because their wealth consists almost entirely of the value of government-created and -enforced privileges such as land titles, bank licenses, IP monopolies, oil and mineral rights, broadcast spectrum allocations, etc.

 

Translation: don't try to defend yourself when rich people legally steal from you.

Why do you hate justice so much? Is it because you intend to profit from injustice?

Why do you want to force ordinary people to subsidize the super-duper uber-rich even more than they are already forced to?

Maybe because they have no income to tax?

Maybe because what they have "achieved success" at is legally stealing from everyone else?

But the super-duper uber-rich are even cagier by pitting the average taxpayer against people who are even worse off than he is. That ploy lets the rich keep legally stealing from everyone else.

A sales tax would be even worse than income tax. Why do you hate justice so much?

I.e., that they are forced to subsidize the super-duper uber-rich.

True: people should be taxed according to the publicly created value of the government-created and enforced privileges they own, not how much they contribute to production by their labor.

 

But why should our income be taxed? Why should working people be taxed in proportion to how much they contribute to the wealth of the community by their labor?

 

The farmer who owns the goose isn't laying the eggs. He's just the one who is legally entitled to take them.

 

The little people don't gain anything from government programs because all the value of public spending on desirable services and infrastructure is taken by landowners in increased land rents. THAT'S WHY LAND COSTS SO MUCH. Google "Henry George Theorem" and start reading.

 

Income tax is the fairest tax.

 

The poster in #17, to whom I was replying, would take 100% of the farmer's egg-derived value, regardless of the farmer's role.

 

Nonsense. There is nothing in any way fair about taxing people according to what they contribute to the wealth of the community by their labor. It has been known for well over 200 years that the fairest tax is a tax on the unimproved rental value of land, which is created by government, the community and nature, not by the owner. Why should the owner get to pocket it as a subsidy? Why should that subsidy not be repaid to the government and community that provide it?

 

Because most wealth is not derived from the unimproved rental value of land, and most consumption of government services is not on behalf of land or landowners.

 

I think the gravamen of his comment was that before we propose to tax anyone or anything, we should be very careful to identify clearly the precise roles of the farmhand, the goose, the farm's owner, the goose's owner, etc.

 

So what? Why should the wealth that people create privately be taken by government via income tax and given to landowners in the form of increased unimproved rental value of land, in return for nothing?

Wrong. Everyone who wants to access the desirable public services and infrastructure taxes pay for must first pay landowners full market value just for permission to do so. Google "Henry George Theorem" and start reading.

THAT'S WHY LAND COSTS SO MUCH.

 

I really don't care. I thought the comment was stupid.

 

It was an absurd hypothetical, granted, and maybe I am reading too much into it; but I thought he was trying to make a point.

 

We're not going to agree.

"George was right that other taxes may have stronger disincentives, but economists now recognize that the single land tax is not innocent, either. Site values are created, not intrinsic. Why else would land in Tokyo be worth so much more than land in Mississippi? A tax on the value of a site is really a tax on productive potential, which is a result of improvements to land in the area. Henry George’s proposed tax on one piece of land is, in effect, based on the improvements made to the neighboring land.

And what if you are your “neighbor”? What if you buy a large expanse of land and raise the value of one portion of it by improving the surrounding land. Then you are taxed based on your improvements. This is not far-fetched. It is precisely what the Disney Corporation did in Florida. Disney bought up large amounts of land around the area where it planned to build Disney World, and then made this surrounding land more valuable by building Disney World. Had George’s single tax on land been in existence, Disney might never have made the investment. So, contrary to George’s reasoning, even a tax on unimproved land reduces incentives."
Problems with Henry George's Single Tax - Econlib
https://www.econlib.org › archives › 2012/02 › proble...

Feb 14, 2012 — Bryan Caplan makes a good point with his and Zac Gochenour's search-theoretic critique of Henry George's tax on the value of unimproved land ...

 

Indifference is my superpower.

 

Yes; that is because I am right and you are wrong.

Oh, really? Which "economists" might those be?

Right: they are created by government and the community, not the owner. That is the point.

David Henderson, who wrote that stupid garbage, is clearly not aware of the Law of Rent. Land in Tokyo is worth so much more than land in Mississippi because the economic advantage obtainable by using it is so much greater thanks to the presence of the desirable services and infrastructure government provides, the opportunities and amenities the community provides, and the physical qualities nature provides at those respective locations. You may note the absence from that list of anything the landowner provides.

Right: the productive potential which the site's owner did not and does not create, but to which he deprives everyone else of access.

No, that claim is false. Local improvements are only one component. The others are listed above. Henderson is either an economic ignoramus or a liar.

In part. Thus, it requires the landowner to repay the community for the economic opportunity of which he is depriving everyone else. It is a voluntary, market-based, beneficiary-pay, value-for-value transaction.

You can't be. Such claims are self-evidently absurd.

No you aren't. The whole parcel is taxed as if it were vacant and unimproved. It is the current property tax that taxes you based on your improvements. Duh.

Yes, actually, it is, which is why there are no actual examples.

No, Henderson is ignoring the vast amount of desirable services and infrastructure the local and state governments supplied in the area to make Disney World practicable, as well as the opportunities and amenities every private concern in the area other than Disney provided, but whose value Disney appropriated.

That is possible because the proposed tax on land rent ensures that each land parcel is devoted to its most efficient and productive use, and that might not be Disney World. However, if Disney did not have to pay any other taxes, they would probably have invested even more, as they would know they would have to earn their returns by actually providing value, and could not just pocket increased land value others created. We have no way of knowing what more productive investments were NOT made on that land because the Georgist land tax was NOT in existence. See how that works?

The tax is not on unimproved land, only the unimproved value of land, so Henderson is just a liar. Moreover, the fact that it reduces the incentive to make particular investments that rely on the investor being able to pocket land value increases does not in any way argue that it reduces incentives to make more productive investments. Henderson could with equal "logic" argue that laws against protection rackets reduce the incentive for protection racketeers to invest in hiring thugs.

Fred Foldvary demolished that stupid, dishonest garbage in the comments, which were conveniently closed before anyone could demolish and humiliate Jim Glass for the economic incompetence and dishonesty he displayed in his final rejoinder.

More garbage. Caplan and Gochenour have also been duly demolished.

 

As you wish. The sentence "I am right and you are wrong." is a discussion ender for me.