Exactly what do they do with the money. Fed gov should go back to categorical grants and stop with block grants etc. But you know the States Alabama, Ketucky…
Hmm. Those weren’t the ones I was talking about.
I would say it is a race to sustainability. If you tax too little, revenue is short – Tax too much - capital flight… The arbitrage of these markets will get even more efficient because of technologies like maidSAFE…
Even NY is advertising Tax amnesty to move your capital there… Are they in a “race to the bottom”?
This isn’t exactly on topic, but don’t pay income taxes on garage sales items! In the US you typically don’t pay on income taxes on garage sales items because you had a capital loss. If you sold the item for more than purchased, then a gain is realized, and income taxes must be paid. The IRS also specifically stipulates that you cannot file for a capital loss unless the good was bought for financial purposes (i.e. intended to make money). I briefly hoped I could write my projector sale as a capital loss - not possible for personal items.
Like how the FBI seizes assets and sells them before the accused is ever convicted of a crime? I wonder what would’ve happened if Ross Ullbricht was acquited. His assets were already gone!
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The only reason they were gone, I believe, was that they captured his laptop with the private keys. My point exactly. His security failed, not the currency’s security.
On the garage sale thing, you miss my point. As more commerce takes place in less trackable circumstances, more people will tend to skip involving an involuntary third party that doesn’t contribute to the exchange. Free markets are about VOLUNTARY interaction. Some few people say they pay taxes voluntarily, but that’s like saying you voluntarily pay protection money to keep your restaurant from “accidentally” burning down.
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I’m one of the few then, but I don’t see it as protection money etc, rather chipping into a pot of money to provide Welfare/infrastructure - rather a safety net instead.
I don’t agree with every way tax is spent by Govt, but this is the issue rather than the basic principle as I see it. Most of my customers pay cash but it all goes through my books and I’m happy to pay my share - again the problem is those that don’t…mainly large Corporations.
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The point is, whether receiving good service or not, should “services” be delivered at the point of a gun? You can only pretend that it is voluntary when your “choice” must factor in the risk of being attacked by an overwhelming force if your choice is unacceptable. Consider the things you and I are funding via taxes that we find morally repugnant. It’s different for everyone but there is no one who isn’t being forced to pay for things they would NEVER fund if not threatened.
Try withholding the part of your “due” that covers, say, drone bombings of innocents, or NSA (or whatever it is that you think they’re doing with your money that you disagree with), and instead redirecting that money to a charity the you consider actually does benefit society. How do you think that will work out?
The fact that you report cash is not the point. I do too. I just realize that extortion is the reason I do it, and call it by its correct name.
Corporations? They can only exist in their current exploitative form by government favor. But even so, Walmart doesn’t hold a gun to your head and require that you pay for TVs for poor people.
This is not a political rant. It harks back to the topic of the thread. What is a true free market? It’s an interplay of voluntary exchanges. SAFE network will support secure, private and free interactions between individuals and groups. It will inhibit involuntary engagements. As people become freer in fact and the consequences of making actual free choices become less, more people will make choices that don’t fit in the ruler/ruled paradigm. They will also hopefully stop considering they are “happily paying their fair share” while ignoring the gun to their heads.
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If that’s the point, then the answer is “No it shouldn’t” and nor is it; the extreme metaphor belies the actual situation. I would say society collectively decided that it is a good idea to chip into a pot to provide infra-structure and a safety net for the vulnerable. This has been become formulated as tax law (and abused, mis-spent etc as you say).
The actual point is that the underlying principle has legitimacy via consensus and the democratic process - how this is abused is another issue. The same “point of a gun” argument can be made for any law that people are expected to abide by.
As far as I know, charity donations are tax exempt, so should work out fine - money goes to a charity that otherwise would go to the taxman.
I would say that it is the other way round, currently whole countries/govts are at the mercy of the Banks/Corporations.
That’s true. So you assume that because it’s a law, it (a) conforms to the ethics and morality of the majority, regardless of the influences of special interests that bribe politicians, (b) allows that the “majority” has the right to enforce individuals who are in the minority to violate their own conscience (e.g., support policies and actions that they find morally reprehensible or downright evil), (c) that individuals who, aggressing against no one, act according to their own conscience should be punished (stolen from, caged or even killed) because their choices differ from what “the majority” have enacted into law.
I understand how you’re looking at things. I invite you to look deeper.
The unit upon which human interactions are built is the choices of the individual. “The majority” is amorphous and theoretical. Even if the majority were a valid concept in this context, as ole Ben Franklin said, “Democracy is two wolves and a sheep voting for what’s for dinner.” But our current political setup isn’t even that straightforward.
This isn’t the place for further debate, I guess. My only point is that a true free market is one which allows the highest level of voluntary interaction. People generally wish to exercise the greatest amount of personal choice, within the constraints of not harming others. (That’s how they handle their personal interactions, mostly.) Anything which contributes to that (like Project SAFE) moves toward freedom and personal responsibility. Things which deny that fact move toward tyranny and “following orders” as a virtue.
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To answer point by point:
a) No
b) No
c) No
I will and I think you raise some interesting arguments. I have a lot to ponder, so will come back to you. I think we can agree the system is broken, but we may differ in our conclusions as to where the problems lie. Anyway, cheers for now, just wanted to give you what I could answer for definite, for now.
I only assert for now that the basic underlying principle of providing for infrastructure and the vulnerable by way of a community pot is a good one. I’m not defending the “tax system” as it stands.
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I do think that if MaidSAFE succeeds it will pave the way for a lot more infrastructure that can be funded via mutual micropayment.
That kind of technology hasn’t really been available before the advent of cryptocurrencies, so mass taxation has always been the default means of paying for infrastructure…
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Here’s where I’m up to, but now need to dis-entangle the more complex, interesting arguments.
No, clearly some laws do and some laws don’t, I certainly don’t equate laws with ethics/morality, and I personally ignore all the laws that I disagree with. I also recognise that some laws/loopholes etc are the result of special interest lobbying and bribery.
Of course not, I’m a Humanist and Human Rights Conventions are (loosely) analogous to my “Bible” This is “Freedom of Conscience”.
Again, of course not, for the same reason
You may ignore all the laws that you disagree with, but those laws will not ignore you if you break them.
I think you hit upon the answer to address Fergish’s concerns. In a decentralised system it may be possible to specifically state where, from a list of options one’s tax is spent - this would nullify all freedom of conscience concerns. As to whether this is still “coercive” to some, then I don’t really care if I’m honest…and it’s a different argument about whether one has a responsibility to contribute to the Society they live in - any alternative I can think of to make completely voluntary seems un-workable.
Also your tax goes directly to the Govt, not directly to fund wars etc. You could just give cash to anybody, does that make you morally responsible for what they then do with it? It also pays for both good and bad things, you can’t possibly know which fund it goes towards - your conscience should be clear.
It seems your argument is more with Govt policy than the tax system.
This may be as high as is possible, so meets the requirements.
Lol…I’m fully aware of that and fully intend to continue to ignore them…but thanks for the warning. Are you wagging your finger at me and tutting?..lol
Maybe a little finger wagging 
Forgive me I’m American, but what is tutting?
Hmmm…it’s a sound one makes to express dis-approval…West Indians (maybe Afro-Americans) would call it “sucking your teeth.” Best I can do.
Interesting. I’m sure that Southern plantation owners in the mid 1800s had a hard time thinking how it would be workable to not own slaves. After all, “Who’d pick the cotton?”
“Who’d build the roads?” or “How would we handle criminals?” are precisely the same sort of questions as “Who’d pick the cotton?”
Should the answer be “Hey, I know! Let’s make everyone a slave till about May of each year (well, at least June if you consider state and local), then they can be free the rest of the time. That’s okay, cause we’ll give them some roads and stuff, whether they need or want them or not. Brilliant!”?
It’s easy to assume that left to their own devices, people wouldn’t want roads, or wouldn’t want to help less fortunate people, or wouldn’t want an environment free of violence. If that were the case then democracy would be a sham anyway, because the majority of the people wouldn’t want roads, or help for the unfortunate, or a calm safe neighborhood. But the actually do, by and large.
If you start with forcing people to pay against their will, it’s all downhill from there. You don’t have to look further as to what is fundamentally wrong. The US was founded on the principle of limiting the state, and thus insuring maximum personal liberty. Many advances have been made proceeding on that theory, but one of the results (because of the creeping concept of the right to steal from all) is . . . Well, you can decide what we have to day.
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Lol…You love your over the top analogies and metaphors don’t you? I’ve already answered your, abc’s and your main argument concerning Freedom of Conscience. We have now moved on to the coercive/involuntary nature of taxation I see, so you have nothing further to say in response to my answers regarding conscience?
I have also repeatedly stated I am not defending the current tax system, just the fundamental concept of providing a societal safety net. I’m certainly not going to be defending 19th Century Plantation owners or Slavery…lol…neither of which appears to have anything to do with the basic concept I was defending.
Ok, this demonstrates there is common consensus and what’s left of your concerns is that some people are forced to pay against their own self interest. This is incorrect, or rather it is correct in exactly the same way as me choosing to smoke a spliff, I can argue the relative harm health cases (I do), sign petitions to get the law changed (I do) etc - do you do any of this in regard to taxation? I also know I run the risk of prosecution etc - do you think for one minute I would have the temerity and disrespect to compare my situation to that of a Plantation Slave?
Instead of me continuing to defend not only what I intended to defend but apparently the Govt, tax system and plantation owners - why don’t you tell me your model and I’d be happy to give it a critical appraisal?
The nice thing about the revolution is that it is coming despite anyone’s opinion about it.
What will be will be.
Having strong central governments has run it’s course, Now nearly every country is the world is in debt up to it’s eyeballs… Who do they owe? The central banks… Where did the central banks get the money to loan? They made it up like a cheap altcoin… The whole system is insolvent and ripe for replacement…
Now there is a new way to transmit value… Infrastructure can be built and maintained by folks who use it. Just like MaidSAFE – It will take 10 or 20 years, but it will all work out.
But it really doesn’t matter - because the Crytporevolution castrates the state… Yes, there will be some things a centralized system might be better at – but too bad, so sad, the system has built a road right around their tollbooth.
Not really much sense in debating the merits of the old way – we aren’t going to un-invent cryptography or crytocurrencies.
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I’d just like to ensure society’s vulnerable have a safety net and I recognise we need infrastructure. If anybody has a better system than the current broken one to provide these things then I’m 100% all for it, if this could be 100% voluntary I’m all for it too, but it does not sound feasible to me. I don’t see the option of not providing these things as a viable option either. I’m all ears though.
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