Taxes, fucking you from every direction since before it was cool!
There are quite a few different types of taxes. If you start to think about them, you might start to think that you're being charged for the privileged of living. There are fines taxes for earning income, taxes for spending that income, taxes for owning a house, sin taxes, tariffs on imports, etc.
Image by TaxRebate.org.uk - CC BY 2.0 (source)
It seems a little weird to me that we're taxed for earning income or living in a house. It seems to me like governments should be more selective about how they tax and what.
I'm a little weird in my political beliefs. I don't strictly conform to any set political party. While I might believe that we should work together for the common benefit of our country, I don't really agree with all of our taxes.
One tax I really don't agree with is housing taxes. You already bought the fucker once, and now you have to pay the government every year, based on what some appraiser says?
Remember when the housing market crashed and it turned out that the prices of houses were artificially inflated by a bunch of assholes giving out easy loans? So all those years of taxes were based on artificially inflated prices. Granted, the housing market has mostly recovered, but what if it's still artificially inflated? You won't get any of that money back.
And what about someone that inherits a house from a relative? What if they're not exactly rich? They could easily lose a family house due to not being able to afford the taxes. Then they're put out on the street, their family house taken from them, and then sold for likely a fraction of the worth that they claimed it had.
Whenever I bring this up to someone though, they always say that they have to pay for the roads and the fire departments and the police. But do they need to do it through property taxes? Everyone has to live somewhere, so why isn't it included in the massive amount you pay in income taxes? Why do they have to separate it out? Is it so that you don't notice how much you're paying? What about sales taxes?
I'm not really against a country using taxes to raise money for its operations, but I'm pretty sure I have a problem with how they tax people, as well as how much they waste, and what they spend it on, but that's not what this rant is about.
This rant is about how the government chooses to tax people, and being perplexed as to why so many seem to have no issues with it. Why is it alright for a government to tax your income and expenses? Why is it alright to tax it as it comes in, and then again as it goes out? Not only is your income taxed, but the business is taxed before they pay you. Every dollar you have is just a fraction of the amount you actually should have due to all of the taxes that have been levied against it.
As I said though, I'm not fully against taxes. Governments need to pay for schools (though I'd prefer if they were better and were less like prisons), and they need to pay for transportation and infrastructure (though I'd prefer bullet trains to roads made of tar and rocks that are constantly in disrepair), and they need to pay for defense (though I kind of disagree that bombs are defensive weapons). So if they aren't going to tax every dollar until you earn just a mear fraction of what you worked for, then how should they raise money?
In my opinion, they should tighten their belt, and realize that the money they're spending isn't theirs, and they are entrusted treasurers of the public, but beyond that, I think they should earn it. Often when I tell people about this idea they say some crap about communism and the government interfering with private enterprise or some other crap, but I think it's better than the way they're currently raising money, and our government already sells guns. What's so wrong with the government producing goods that are needed by its people, and then using the profits to ensure they don't have to tax people quite as horribly?
There are tons of things that almost every American needs. Why can't we have factories building American fridges or stoves? Is that really worse than buying something that was probably made in another country? They'd just have to be priced so they don't completely undercut the competition. Why is that so horrible?
Give me your opinion, and tell me what you think.
At least in the USA, a real tax reform wold be very welcome. I remember doing the full 1040 by hand and getting taxed on the ammount of taxes I overpaid and had refunded in the previous year. "You paid too much, here it is back. Oh, but we're going to tax you on what you overpaid."
We might feel better, if the money was well spent.
I have trouble imagining what it would be like if our money was well spent. They'd have to audit the budget and debate on projects that just get rubber stamped currently.
Have you watched CSPAN before? They don't even listen to each other.
Taxation is theft.
This article was hard to understand with my custom browser extension that replaces all variants of the word "tax" with "theft."
Hear, hear!
You listen here, dickhead. You keep your filthy, uncircumcised glans off of my roads. I am very serious about roads. In all my years, I have heard many arguments for taxation ranging all the way from defence, to public safety, to education, to helping the poor. Only one of them gave me pause...
You're probably one of those heathens who agree with this misanthrope:
Don't. Fuck. With my roads.
Notice I specifically mentioned what the roads were made of. I believe we need to stop wasting money on roads that break down so easily and then leaving them in disrepair.
I still like bullet trains more than EVERYONE driving a car in a city though, or even between major cities. Traffic sucks. Crashing sucks. I would prefer if we could hop on a train and go between cities in minutes.
I'm fine with taxing gas and cars to pay for roads. Especially if we actually built them correctly. But we need public transpo even more.
As to the video...ehh...we will get self-driving cars. Not everyone likes driving, and there are a lot of features that will make them safer. We don't necessarily need to give over complete control though. We could allow a driver to enable and disable features if we wanted to. For example, we've long had cruise control in cars. We might have a button to have the car automatically do that equidistance crap. Or we could stop at a light and turn on automatic acceleration. Or we could enjoy driving, and turn it all off, except on long boring drives, when we want the car to mostly drive itself.
But I still think bullet trains are the solution. Self-driving cars are cool, but they can't go 500 mph.
I know what you mean. Of course, ruling elites have their ways to evade taxes. While we down here continue to feed politicians with the little money we make. That's why I chose to be a nomad/fugitive, it can be a lonely lifestyle. But that's just the price of freedom.