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Taxation is Over, If You Want It
Over at reason.tv, I've posted a video Jan Helfeld of Free Liberal—I hope he wouldn't be offended if I call him the Libertarian Borat—and his uproarious interview with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid just up.
HELFELD: If the government is in the business of forcefully taking money from some people in order to pay for the welfare of others, how will the people whose wealth is being taken feel about the government?
REID: Well, I don't accept your phraseolgy. I don't think we force.
HELFELD: Taxation is not forceful?
REID: Well, no. In fact, quite to the contrary. Our system of government is a voluntary tax system.
It goes on like this.
meerdahl|4.1.08 @ 3:02PM|#
April fool? If this is true, this quote will be used in a 100 wacko tax protester cases.
NoStar|4.1.08 @ 3:04PM|#
Of course it's voluntary. And I'm here to tell you, you've been volunteered.
jrl|4.1.08 @ 3:06PM|#
The real problem here is that the technical term used to describe our system is "voluntary" since the government does not literally take the money from you. That's what Reid is arguing about. It's really a poor word choice in this instance, as you are (obviously) still forced to pay your taxes. There's nothing "voluntary" about that.
Episiarch|4.1.08 @ 3:07PM|#
Hmm, can't watch the clip at work but at the freeliberal site
there are posters remarking that "voluntary" is a tax term that
applies to the US system, making Reid technically correct, at least
as tax terminology goes. In terms of the real point and the common
usage of "voluntary", Reid sounds like he's being an obfuscating
asshole politician who is hiding behind a tax industry term.
However, Reid could also really just not get it. I've had
conversations with people who could not understand that taxes are
taken from you by force.
Some of them got it after we followed what happens to you if you
don't pay your taxes: eventually men with guns show up and take you
away.
Some of them got it after I asked "if we had a lottery in this
country where winners didn't have to pay income tax this year,
would you pay yours anyway?"
Since the answer was always "no" (they stayed honest because anyone
besides Warren Buffet who says yes is an obvious liar), they
thought about it a little more.
Mothers Against High Fructose |4.1.08 @ 3:09PM|#
So it's voluntary in that you get to decide within a narrow
window when you have to pay, and are allowed some flexibility in
the amount you pay by claiming various hardships (aka
deductions).
But, if you mess up and leave the boundaries they lay out, you go
to jail. If you try to opt out, you go to jail.
Man, the mafia must be glad to hear that they are in the
"voluntary" protection business.
|4.1.08 @ 3:10PM|#
I reckon if you voluntarily underproduce all year and make very
little, like me, then you get a fat "refund" after the year is out.
I volunteered to be a lazy ass and i paid no tax. In fact, I made a
net gain.
Oh yeah. and I thank all of you over achievers that made it
possible.
|4.1.08 @ 3:12PM|#
I've had conversations with people who could not understand
that taxes are taken from you by force.
I think people are misled by the difference between the "potential"
use of force and the actual use of force. A government agent
doesn't show up at your door to make you pay your
taxes...unless you don't pay. So you are only indirectly
forced to. I think that the lack of an overt use of force tends to
make people think they are not actually being forced.
Other Matt|4.1.08 @ 3:13PM|#
After listening to Reid, all I can say is I guess that shows where joe gets his lack of logic from. Wow.
|4.1.08 @ 3:18PM|#
Reid is passe. The next senate majority leader, Hillary Clinton, will make no quibble about it being collected at the point of a gun.
Highway|4.1.08 @ 3:22PM|#
The problem with the folks that are saying that Reid was using
the 'technically correct' definition of a voluntary tax system is
that he was obviously trying to obfuscate the point about coercion
by using the colloquial meaning of 'voluntary'. So it doesn't
matter if he's right as far as the meaning of a 'Voluntary tax
system'. He's trying to use 'voluntary' to rebut 'coercive', which
is patently false.
He can't have it mean BOTH things and be correct.
Furious George|4.1.08 @ 3:24PM|#
A tax is coercive by nature. That can hardly be considered voluntary.
Al|4.1.08 @ 3:26PM|#
REID: Well, no. In fact, quite to the contrary. Our system of
government is a voluntary tax system.
|4.1.08 @ 3:28PM|#
Tax Fraud Prosecution
After the (CID) has conducted an investigation and has recommended
prosecution to the Justice Department, there are three crimes with
which an individual may be charged:
* Tax evasion: This is an intentional violation of tax laws. It is
a broad category, encompassing any cheating of the government in
taxes. Tax evasion is a FELONY and a very serious crime. A
conviction for tax evasion can carry with it up to a five-year
prison sentence and/or fines up to $100,000.
* Filing a false return: Prosecution for this crime is appropriate
when a taxpayer has provided the government with false or
misleading information on the taxpayer's tax return. In such cases,
the government does not have to prove the taxpayer intended to
evade tax laws. Rather, it merely must prove that the taxpayer
filed a false return. Filing a false return is a felony. Punishment
for this crime can consist of up to three years in prison and/or up
to $100,000 in fines.
* Not filing a tax return at all: Failing to file a tax return is
the least serious of the three tax crimes. It is a MISDEMEANOR. The
consequences for being found guilty is a maximum of 1 year in
prison and/or fines totaling up to $25,000 for each year a taxpayer
failed to file.
|4.1.08 @ 3:32PM|#
The 1% of my taxes that goes to "welfare" bothers me exactly 1/20th as much as the 20% of my taxes that go into frivolous military hardware and war. Both buckets need to be hosed out.
|4.1.08 @ 3:48PM|#
I don't remember my employer giving me the opt-out option. I had
no choice in the matter. Sure it's voluntary, assuming the term has
nothing to do with choice.
But should we be suprised that a Senator is throwing out the
dictionary since the Executive branch no longer uses one.
robc|4.1.08 @ 3:49PM|#
shrike,
While I agree with you as far as both buckets, 1% is well off.
Looking at a quick google found pie chart, "welfare" made up at
least 49%, more depending on what was in the 21% "Everything elese"
category. 21% was for defense, so you were dead on for that
category.
|4.1.08 @ 3:49PM|#
"""Hillary Clinton certainly is more of a man than Harry
Reid."""
yeah, why do you think Bill cheats.
TallDave|4.1.08 @ 3:51PM|#
REID: Well, no. In fact, quite to the contrary. Our system
of government is a voluntary tax system.
Hmmm, all this time the IRS have been a bunch of vigilante
terrorists. Who knew?
|4.1.08 @ 4:06PM|#
robc-
Social Security and Medicare are the shabbiest of retirement
entitlement plans, but most certainly are not "welfare" programs.
They must be earned - as low as that bar is.
I realize that this fact does not fit well in the "socialist" meme
under construction here, but any real discussion of runaway
spending must acknowledge this fact.
btw - I fall into the Richard Lamm school of Medicare cost
reduction - if you're dying and 80 years old there is no need to
bankrupt Medicare to prolong your life for a few weeks.
I am just trying to be honest - the LP gets no points for
pod-screaming "welfare queen" at former factory workers on their
deserved SS take.
|4.1.08 @ 4:06PM|#
Let's end employer withholding and have the government bill everyone every April 15th, then have the IRS send its brand of bill collectors to visit the deadbeats. I don't think we'd have a question about "voluntary" anymore.
|4.1.08 @ 4:07PM|#
The CIA, and assumably some other intel agencies, can hide its
budget anywhere it wants. I'm not so sure that it isn't within the
entitlements catagory. Hell, that's the best place to hide
it.
Pending on how you look at the term welfare, you could describe our
entire budget in two catagories. 1. Welfare for US citizens. 2.
Welfare for non-us citizens.
|4.1.08 @ 4:12PM|#
"""Social Security and Medicare are the shabbiest of retirement
entitlement plans, but most certainly are not "welfare" programs.
They must be earned - as low as that bar is."""
Maybe earned, but more importantly, you pay into them. That's why
they wouldn't be welfare. There is nothing wrong with expecting
something in return for your investment.
But I'd rather have my tax money support the poor people of the US
than the poor people of, say Iraq, or the rest of the world.
TallDave|4.1.08 @ 4:14PM|#
Maybe earned, but more importantly, you pay into them.
That's why they wouldn't be welfare.
No, more of a mandatory Ponzi scheme really.
robc|4.1.08 @ 4:17PM|#
No one pays into Social Security.
Legally, as the Supremes have ruled multiple times, there is no,
zero, zilch, nada connection between the FICA tax and the welfare
payments we receive after age 65/67/whatever.
There is a social security tax.
There are social security payments.
They have nothing to do with each other.
|4.1.08 @ 4:22PM|#
The real problem here is that the technical term used to
describe our system is "voluntary" since the government does not
literally take the money from you.
I guess its "voluntary" because you sign a check, is that about
it?
Seriously, could you describe what an "involuntary" tax system
would look like?
JD|4.1.08 @ 4:31PM|#
It's 'voluntary' because you have to volunteer your information. Of course, if you volunteer wrong, the everpresent Men With Guns would like to talk to you - never mind the fact that the government won't (can't, really) tell you how much you owe before you possibly get it wrong. It is a cruel joke, but I think people like Reid are missing the part of their brain that lets them get the joke.
|4.1.08 @ 4:33PM|#
If the SS/Medicare buckets had been kept separate they would be
solvent through 2090.
So "welfare" (not my term for SS) has subsidized the War Department
for the last 40 years? And exactly WHO has befitted?
Lockheed Martin, Halliburton, Raytheon, etc,
Most of you don't know who the real "welfare queens" are.
Tsu Dho Nihm|4.1.08 @ 4:33PM|#
Our tax system is as voluntary as was the system used by the
Mongols to collect tribute from the Russians. So long as the
Russians sent the proper amount of tribute to the khan, all was
well. Otherwise, the Mongols came and got the tribute themselves.
With a bit of looting, pillaging, raping, burning, and general
mayhem to make things interesting.
Yep. Pretty much the same voluntary system we have now, except the
Feds have tanks and automatic weapons instead of fleet-footed
horses and bow 'n' arrows.
robc|4.1.08 @ 4:35PM|#
shrike,
To paraphrase PJ O'Rourke: In a democracy, the welfare queens are
us.
|4.1.08 @ 4:40PM|#
Social Security payroll taxes are collected under authority of
the Federal Insurance Contributions Act (FICA). The payroll taxes
are sometimes even called "FICA taxes."
In the original 1935 law the benefit provisions were in Title II of
the Act (which is why we sometimes call Social Security the "Title
II" program.) The taxing provisions were in a separate title, Title
VIII. There is a deep reason for this, having to do with the
constitutionality of the law (see discussion of the
Constitutionality of the 1935 Act).
As part of the 1939 Amendments, the Title VIII taxing provisions
were taken out of the Social Security Act and placed in the
Internal Revenue Code. Since it wouldn't make any sense to call
this new section of the Internal Revenue Code "Title VIII," it was
renamed the "Federal Insurance Contributions Act."
The payroll taxes collected for Social Security are of course
taxes, but they can also be described as contributions to the
social insurance system that is Social Security. Hence the name
"Federal Insurance Contributions Act."
So FICA is nothing more than the tax provisions of the Social
Security Act, as they appear in the Internal Revenue Code.
(source http://www.ssa.gov/mystatement/fica.htm)
What other type of federal insurance can I benefit from other than
SS, SSI, and SSD?
Gilbert Martin|4.1.08 @ 4:45PM|#
"Legally, as the Supremes have ruled multiple times, there is
no, zero, zilch, nada connection between the FICA tax and the
welfare payments we receive after age 65/67/whatever."
Exactly.
There are no individual accounts where each contributor's money is
invested in some unrelated third party investment securities to be
paid back out to that same individual when he or she retires.
Social Security IS a welfare program that takes money away from
individuals who earned it via their own activities and hands it out
to people who did not.
Furthermore, the benefit formula is "progressive" in that the
benefits received by those lower on the income scale are a higher
percentage of the FICA tax dollars they have paid than is the case
for upper income people. That is even more deliberatly
redistributive - and socialist - and welfare.
Oh and the whole program is an unconstitutional violation of the
10th Amendment as well.
Fluffy|4.1.08 @ 4:48PM|#
There is a deep reason for this, having to do with the
constitutionality of the law
Although the cut and pasted text glosses over this, the "deep
reason" is actually the fact that the SCOTUS regards the power to
tax and the other powers of government as distinct acts.
Although taxes can be paid into "the highway fund" or "the SSI
fund", that really is a fiction.
Steven|4.1.08 @ 4:52PM|#
Very amusing interview. There aren't enough humorous political
commentaries going on out there. Here's one I really
recommend:
http://ladycatherinebedamned.blogspot.com
|4.1.08 @ 4:53PM|#
"""Social Security IS a welfare program that takes money away
from individuals who earned it via their own activities and hands
it out to people who did not."""
Sounds a lot like my HMO. I give them money, and they use it for
people that need a service. Insurance is a redistribution of
wealth, it works off the principle that those who do not use the
serivces, pay for those who do.
As a matter of fact, how much Social Security you receive depends
on how much you paid in. Ever read your Social Security statement
they send every year, and compare it to others?
|4.1.08 @ 4:54PM|#
"Social Security IS a welfare program that takes money away from
individuals who earned it via their own activities and hands it out
to people who did not." - Gilbert Martin.
A simple accounting notion with no real functional impact.
In other words, you are on a cash system and I am using the accrual
method.
You still miss the bigger picture - vendors are in line with their
hand extended. When the Social Security interests get to vote
against the military complex interests we will see the real force
of democracy at work.
robc|4.1.08 @ 4:57PM|#
As a matter of fact, how much Social Security you receive
depends on how much you paid in. Ever read your Social Security
statement they send every year, and compare it to
others?
For now. They can change the formula at any times. They could means
test it. They could cut it. They can flatten it out so everyone
gets the same. All legal, there are no property rights attached to
our payments.
|4.1.08 @ 4:59PM|#
Bottom line, we contribute to a federal insurance program. What
type of insurance is it? What type of benefit do I receive as a
contributor to the Federal Insurance.
Can anyone cite some of the SCOTUS cases? Did SCOTUS approve us
paying into a insurance program that provides no benefits?
|4.1.08 @ 5:00PM|#
""No one forces you to be in an HMO."""
Really, there wasn't an opt-out option when I took the job.
Gilbert Martin|4.1.08 @ 5:03PM|#
"A simple accounting notion with no real functional
impact.
In other words, you are on a cash system and I am using the accrual
method."
Nonsense.
The Social Security system has nothing to do with the "accrual
method" of accounting.
It is merely a redistribution of wealth.
"You still miss the bigger picture - vendors are in line with their
hand extended. When the Social Security interests get to vote
against the military complex interests we will see the real force
of democracy at work."
Military contractors have to provide goods and or services in
exchange for the money they get paid. Not the same thing as
welfare.
Now you may think a lot of those tanks, ships, missles, etc. are
unnecessary. But that is merely your personal opinion.
Gilbert Martin|4.1.08 @ 5:05PM|#
"Really, there wasn't an opt-out option when I took the
job."
No one forced you to take the job.
If you don't like the conditions of employment, quit.
|4.1.08 @ 5:05PM|#
It's 'voluntary' because you have to
volunteer
Newspeak, no?
Wouldn't this mean that we had an all-volunteer army during the
draft?
Really, there wasn't an opt-out option when I took the
job.
Seriously? I have never heard of a private-sector employer that
required you to take their benefits as a condition of employment.
Lots of married couples have their benefits with one spouse, and
the other takes none.
Gilbert Martin|4.1.08 @ 5:07PM|#
"Can anyone cite some of the SCOTUS cases? Did SCOTUS approve us
paying into a insurance program that provides no benefits?"
I know that the courts have ruled that Congress can change or
eliminate the SS benefit at any time and that no one has any
standing to sue the government based on prior payment of FICA
taxes.
robc|4.1.08 @ 5:10PM|#
Helvering v. Davis and Flemming v. Nestor from a quick google search. If those arent right, blame CATO.
|4.1.08 @ 5:10PM|#
""""Really, there wasn't an opt-out option when I took the
job."
No one forced you to take the job.
If you don't like the conditions of employment, quit."""
So which is it? Was the job optional or the HMO.
|4.1.08 @ 5:11PM|#
Well, Here is one way to look at it ( and no I am not trying to
defend Harry): MOST ( again probably not all)of "tax protester"
cases involve people claiming fraudulent refunds, not people that
simply don't participate. The way I look at it if you file $0
income returns you are choosing to participate in the tax system.
If you take a w2 job with withholding, if you choose to make over
the filing threshold ( there are many "protesters" who choose to
live on a low income that does not meet federal income tax filing
requirements), and so on.
I could probably get by with a small business with no withholding
and no filing and never be bothered. If however, I file a 0 or
negative income tax and then request million dollar tax credits,
build a mansion/compound, drive a Rolls, and publicly flaunt my
collection of automatic weapons while serving several militias and
tax protest organizations, while selling my " How to Pay $0 Taxes"
book on Amazon and through The Ron Paul Survival Report- well then
I'm probably getting caught.
|4.1.08 @ 5:14PM|#
I suppose it is voluntary in the same sense that a kidnapping is voluntary as long as they ask your opinion of what the proper ransom amount is first. If they disagree with your amount and they are forced to hold you captive for a few years, it is not their fault that you guessed incorrectly.
|4.1.08 @ 5:15PM|#
Thanks robc, I'll look those up later. And I'll write a nasty
letter to CATO if they are wrong. ;-)
Seriously though. Would SCOTUS up hold a federal insurance program
which pays no benefits, and provides no insurance or service? If
they say Social Security is not an insurance under the FICA act,
what insurance is available under that act? Is there any? That
would be unconstitutional taking without compensation. There
couldn't be more clear cut if that is the case.
robc|4.1.08 @ 5:16PM|#
crap! Not retyping all of that. Sigh, need to learn to preview at least when doing complicated tagging.
Gilbert Martin|4.1.08 @ 5:17PM|#
"So which is it? Was the job optional or the HMO."
The job and any and all reqirements related to it are
optional.
No one forced you to work for that employer, now did they?
robc|4.1.08 @ 5:18PM|#
sorry all, hopefully I fixed that.
TrickyVic,
The first of those cases, the supremes ruled that SS isnt an
insurance program.
The second they ruled that the phrase social secutity referred to
two legally unrelated things, a taxation scheme and a welfare
scheme.
Al Capone|4.1.08 @ 5:21PM|#
I could probably get by with a small business with no
withholding and no filing and never be bothered.
I beg to differ.
|4.1.08 @ 5:25PM|#
"""The job and any and all reqirements related to it are
optional."""
ROFLMAO...... all requirements related are optional..... lol...
Damn that's funny. Are you an aide to Reid?
Fluffy|4.1.08 @ 5:27PM|#
Insurance is a redistribution of wealth, it works off the
principle that those who do not use the serivces, pay for those who
do.
That's not really true.
Insurance has been described that way by people eager to
ideologically blur the line between insurance and cooperative
pooling schemes. But my insurance relationship is a contractural
relationship between me and my insurer. Period. In the course of
their business, my insurer does business with many other people,
but that's incidental to my contract with them.
Arbitrage and intermediation conducted by a private party via
contracts with other private parties is not the same as tax schemes
to redistribute wealth. They may look the same from 50,000 feet,
but they aren't the same.
Fluffy|4.1.08 @ 5:29PM|#
ROFLMAO...... all requirements related are optional.....
lol... Damn that's funny. Are you an aide to Reid?
The day they were optional was the day you interviewed. When the
interviewer said, "Here are the job requirements, and here is the
salary and benefits," and you said, "Sign me up!" that was where
you exercised your option.
LarryA|4.1.08 @ 5:35PM|#
The real problem here is that the technical term used to
describe our system is "voluntary" since the government does not
literally take the money from you.
The tax system isn't the only place "voluntary" is misused. There
are also the education programs that require students to do
"volunteer service" as a requirement to graduation, the "community
service volunteers" from the local jail, and the paid "Volunteers
in Service to America" (VISTA) participants.
This year the IRS program is extra "voluntary," since if you fail
to file a return you aren't required to file, you don't get "your"
rebate check.
Gilbert Martin|4.1.08 @ 5:40PM|#
"ROFLMAO...... all requirements related are optional..... lol...
Damn that's funny."
It may be funny but it's also correct.
As I said before, no one forced you to take that job now did
they?
Gilbert Martin|4.1.08 @ 5:43PM|#
" But my insurance relationship is a contractural relationship
between me and my insurer."
Indeed - a VOLUNTARY contractual relationship. You choose what type
of risk you want to insure against and you choose which insurance
company to do business with.
|4.1.08 @ 5:45PM|#
""The second they ruled that the phrase social secutity referred
to two legally unrelated things, a taxation scheme and a welfare
scheme.""
The feds already have a taxation scheme on your income, so how is
FICA not another fed income tax? Legal double taxation? I would
guess it lies in calling it an insurance contribution. But that
would only work if there is acutally something that might look like
insurance in some form. There would have to be some benefit extend
to those who contribute, else it be fraud.
Sure SCOTUS could say there is no insurance when we talk about the
Federal Insurance Contribution. That doesn't make it so. I think
this requires much reading to understand.
|4.1.08 @ 5:49PM|#
"""As I said before, no one forced you to take that job now did
they?""
No but my job did force me to take the HMO.
Focus, the subject is the HMO, not the job.
And you are not correct. Things that are requried can not be
optional, because they are required.
|4.1.08 @ 5:53PM|#
You have an untenable position, Gilbert. Not even the most
brazen Bush partisan would depict SS as "welfare" whilst promoting
unbridled war.
This is the crux of the political matter though. Our creditors are
getting the best of us and our status as the largest debtor nation
will force this discussion soon.
Gilbert Martin|4.1.08 @ 5:54PM|#
"Focus, the subject is the HMO, not the job."
No the focus IS the job and everything that goes with it - which is
what is optional.
You improperly tried to draw an analogy between the social security
system and your HMO.
The HMO participation is a condition of that particular job - which
it was never mandatory for you to accept to begin with.
This is not the case for the government mandating payment for
social security taxes.
Fluffy|4.1.08 @ 6:07PM|#
I would guess it lies in calling it an insurance
contribution.
Your guess would be wrong.
The only purpose the name of the program has is marketing, from a
legal point of view.
The act of taxing and the act of sending a check in the mail to a
retired person are separate, distinct, and discrete
exercises of the power[s] of government, according to the Supreme
Court.
It doesn't matter if you think this is fair, or right, or if you
want to protect the pride of the elderly by pretending SSI is a
bona fide insurance program. It's not.
Not even the most brazen Bush partisan would depict SS as
"welfare" whilst promoting unbridled war.
What does Bush have to do with it? SSI was a welfare scheme decades
before the man held any elective office, and will probably be one
decades after he has left office. The war also has nothing to do
with it. At all. We could just as easily have had this conversation
in 1999 as now.
|4.1.08 @ 6:26PM|#
Bush has a lot to do with "it". In his attempt to rearrange the chairs on the financial Titanic we ride in, he failed to convince that partial privatization of Social Security would help actuarially any at all - much less right things. His secondary motive was to fund forced democratization of the rest of the world. In the case of the latter - the Defense Department would have needed several trillion dollars more than they were budgeted.
Warmongering Lunatic|4.1.08 @ 6:37PM|#
TrickyVic,
Helvering v. Davis (1937) specifically holds that FICA is an
ordinary "income tax on employees", with its revenues going into
the Treasury in the normal way, not being earmarked for any
specific program. It further holds that said income tax is
perfectly legal.
Flemming v. Nestor (1960) then specifically held that payment of
that income tax creates no legal right to or property interest in
Social Security payments; Social Security eligibility is set by
Congress completely independently of whether and how much of the
income tax you pay.
Legally, "FICA" is an ordinary income tax and is paid into the
general Treasury. Legally, Social Security is an ordinary welfare
program with Congressionally-set eligibility requirements, funded
from general Treasury funds. So declared the Supreme Court of the
United States; such is the law in the United States.
|4.1.08 @ 7:08PM|#
Of course taxes are voluntary, in the truest sense of the
word.
Government is a social compact. Part of that compact was giving
them the power to levy taxes, in order to pay for government.
When you were born, your parents made the decision to enter you
into that social compact for you -- since you were underage.
When you turned 18, and every day thereafter, you have reaffirmed
that compact by remaining a United States citizen -- of your own
free will. I don't see people stationed to prevent you from leaving
the country, after all.
You might be tempted to welsh on your end of the compact by
refusing to obey laws or pay taxes -- interestingly enough, part of
the compact involved an enforcement mechanism for the compact.
You're no more forced to pay taxes than you are forced to make your
car payment -- you entered into the loan agreement of your own free
will, after all, and agreed to the enforcement mechanisms.
You might not LIKE the nature of the taxes, you might not LIKE the
nature of the compact, and you might wish to change it -- more
power to you! Go for it! The mechanism for changing the compact is
spelled out rather straight-forwardly in the agreement
itself.
Now, you might claim that there is no place to go TO that will has
a tax-free compact. To which I say "Tough shit", since you're not
owed a perfect world.
But don't sit here and says "Taxes are theft" or "Taxes are taken
by force" when you agree of your own free will to pay taxes
each and every day you remain a citizen of a tax-levying
country.
When and if the US starts forcibly preventing you from renouncing
citizenship and leaving the country for another, I'll have a lot
more sympathy with your argument.
|4.1.08 @ 7:13PM|#
Oh boy, the "love it or leave it" crowd has appeared.
The mechanism for changing the compact is spelled out rather straight-forwardly in the agreement itself.
That's kind of the point of this magazine and the Free Liberal
blog.
|4.1.08 @ 7:16PM|#
Very good, Morat.
We are obliged to the law of our own making (the consent of the
governed). Our "rights" are self-defined - they just don't drop on
us from Zeus.
The remedy is simple - we own it.
pukool|4.1.08 @ 7:42PM|#
@morat20:
It's actually a pain in the ass to renounce your citizenship. The
State Department doesn't like people to be "stateless".
So, in the case of Vince Cate, he bought foreign citizenship first
so that he could renounce his American citizenship.
"Before renouncing his U.S. citizenship, Cate became a citizen of
Mozambique for a fee of about $5,000. "This makes me an
American-African", he joked.
Cate's current home, Anguilla, requires people to wait 15 years
before applying for citizenship. He moved there in 1994 and has
worked to establish strong ties."
http://www.efc.ca/pages/media/nytimes.06sep98.html
|4.1.08 @ 7:52PM|#
Loathe though I am to say it, unless you're an anarchist, "love
it or leave it" is the terminus of discussion on government.
I'm just not that religiously inclined.
|4.1.08 @ 8:25PM|#
I never signed this "social contract" (or at least your version
of it, since everyone disagrees with what our social contract
says), and the decision to enter me into it CANNOT be legitimately
made by someone else.
Anyway, your argument, the Crito/legal positivist argument is
dangerous and insane. Legal positivism is what gave us the nazis.
Hitler was democratically elected. By your reasoning, the Germans
were inclined by their location within Germany to obey the duly
elected authority.
The real social contract is intuitive and organic. Do not initiate
force against any person, or his or her possessions.
|4.1.08 @ 8:30PM|#
"When and if the US starts forcibly preventing you from
renouncing citizenship and leaving the country for another, I'll
have a lot more sympathy with your argument."
Forcing someone to leave in order to avoid someone else's
initiation of force DOES restrict our freedom to live and do
business where we are. Your reasoning assumes that the government
owns the land it claims, and so can enforce its own bullying laws
anywhere.
No authority is legitimate to the extent that it tries to enforce
an unnatural law.
|4.1.08 @ 8:39PM|#
Every day you were under age and unable to affirm this social
contract you were taking the benefits of this contract. You and
your parents were protected with the police and the army from
enemies domestic and foriegn. Your parents drove on government
roads to the hospital to have you. I'm sure your parents took you
to the library at some point and you read a book or two. You've
surely played on the sliding board at the local park.
So OK, now that you are of age and don't want to do your part of
the contract, let's have the value of all those services you've
been taking all these years first.
|4.1.08 @ 8:53PM|#
None of these "welfare" opponents offer a solution to the
problem. As much as I dislike Bush - he did venture into the area
(but true to form he was a complete failure).
So here is mine - at the age of 50 you may opt out of Social
Security and Medicare. No more FICA - no benefits. This is the peak
of your earning power.
Criticism accepted.
|4.1.08 @ 9:06PM|#
@mr. nice guy: you misunderstand. I am not opposed to roads,
military or police. (And my parents certainly paid more into the
system than they ever received, and I have payed a vast amount
myself).
What I am opposed to is taxation used to support non-legitimate
uses of government (invading countries, corporate welfare, etc.),
then justifying it after the fact with the "social contract"
argument, which is dangerous because, without tempering the social
contract with the acceptance of natural rights, tyranny becomes not
only possible, but inevitable.
|4.1.08 @ 10:17PM|#
Mr. Nice Guy:
"The State indeed performs many important and necessary functions:
from provision of law to the supply of police and fire fighters, to
building and maintaining the streets, to delivery of the mail. But
this in no way demonstrates that only the State can perform such
functions, or that it performs them even passably well."
-Murray Rothbard
|4.1.08 @ 10:19PM|#
kevin
I sympathize as someone who hates wars and corporate welfare, but
every couple of years we the people get together and decide what is
and is not a "legitmate" use of government by a majority vote (not
perfect but better than a minotiry vote). And the majority has
decided that, just like the roads and police, some wars and
corporate welfare is legitimate...
As for natural rights, I repeat a famous quote: "Natural law is
nonsense, and natural rights is nonsense on stilts."
|4.1.08 @ 10:21PM|#
Who gets to say what the "natural rights" are? You? Me? I say a
majority is best to ask...
I bet Hitler never thought he ever committed a violation of natural
rights, as he saw it...
Gilbert Martin|4.1.08 @ 10:44PM|#
"Not even the most brazen Bush partisan would depict SS as
"welfare" whilst promoting unbridled war."
Neither the current Iraq war nor Bush has anything to do with
social security being 'welfare" or not.
Furthermore you obviously have no idea what an "unbrideled war" is
because Iraq certainly isn't even close to being one.
An "unbrideled war" would be an all out global thermomuclear
war.
|4.1.08 @ 10:45PM|#
Who gets to say what the "natural rights" are? You?
Me?
How about "nobody" and the only authority you appeal to anymore is
"you"?
Chumbawumba|4.2.08 @ 12:09AM|#
We have a word for this in the United States Navy ... it's "voluntold". Thats when a superior asks something like " who wants to strip and wax the deck today?" When met with silence, he then tells someone to do it. Thus, he volunteers you to do the task. Voluntold.
The Wine Commonsewer|4.2.08 @ 12:25AM|#
To quote my good friend Rick H.....
The current (Social Security) system discourages thrift, encourages
dependency, and, yes, even undermines families by breaking the
economic bonds between generations. And it is based on a lie: that
retirees are simply collecting money they "paid in." There is, of
course, no real economic relation between the taxes working people
pay and the benefits they collect as retirees. Both are simply set
politically, giving all retirees a vested interest in the welfare
state
The Wine Commonsewer|4.2.08 @ 12:36AM|#
You're no more forced to pay taxes than you are forced to
make your car payment -- you entered into the loan agreement of
your own free will, after all, and agreed to the enforcement
mechanisms.
Well, not exactly, since Bank of America ain't going to put you in
jail for not paying your car payment.
The Wine Commonsewer|4.2.08 @ 12:43AM|#
let's have the value of all those services you've been
taking all these years first.
WTF?
What services? I get pretty much zero for the taxes I pay. It is
money flushed. I prefer to think of it as protection money. If I
pay my taxes, I don't go to jail.
Sue Murphy put it like this:
I owe the government $3400 in taxes. So I sent them two hammers and
a toilet seat
|4.2.08 @ 1:06AM|#
This may be a very stupid question, but if (for Social Security)
we are only collecting money paid in, why pay in in the first
place?
I mean what kind of service is it to take someone's money away,
then give it back later?
I think this supports the "Ponzi scheme" theory of S.S., or maybe
the "its actually welfare" theory".
Gilbert Martin|4.2.08 @ 8:43AM|#
"This may be a very stupid question, but if (for Social
Security) we are only collecting money paid in, why pay in in the
first place?"
Becuase the recipients are not collecting money that they paid in
of course - they are getting someone else's money. It's all in
furtherance of the socialist goal of wealth redistribution.
If social security were an actual forced saving program, it would
be run like 401Ks with indiviudual accounts that are invested in
income producing assets (stocks, bonds, mutual funds, etc.)
But that would not allow for redistribution - the real purpose of
the program.
|4.2.08 @ 10:16AM|#
But that would not allow for redistribution - the real purpose of the program.
No, actually, the real purpose of the program is to raise
revenue.
This is accomplished by the fiction of the Social Security Trust
Fund.
The real purpose of that "surplus" is not to somehow "save for the
future" but to provide revenue for current expenditures while
pretending to keep taxes low. "Your FICA payments are not a tax,
they're pension contributions."
|4.2.08 @ 10:27AM|#
If the SS/Medicare buckets had been kept separate they would be solvent through 2090.
How exactly does one go about this?
Exactly where does the SS "surplus" go?
There are two things that a government can do with current revenue.
It can spend it* or it can take it out of circulation.
The portraits of dead presidents (and other assorted VIPs) can
either be doled out to various recipients or they can be put into a
furnace and burned. They can't be sewed into the mattress in the
Lincoln bedroom and kept until "we" need to spend them.
Oh, wait, there's a third thing. The government could be putting
money into the nation's equity markets. But I'm pretty sure there's
not many of us in favor of Uncle Sam trying to pick winners on Wall
Street. I know I don't.
|4.2.08 @ 5:13PM|#
"""Helvering v. Davis (1937) specifically holds that FICA is an
ordinary "income tax on employees", with its revenues going into
the Treasury in the normal way, not being earmarked for any
specific program. It further holds that said income tax is
perfectly legal.""
My income is being taxed by the feds via federal income tax for the
purpose of the general fund, then my income is being taxed again by
the feds but they calling it something different but it still goes
to the general fund. I am curious as to how this is not double
taxation.
""I owe the government $3400 in taxes. So I sent them two hammers
and a toilet seat"""
That's the funniest thing I've heard all day. I'll send them wrench
and give them that same dumb explaination the DOD contractor gave
us back in the day. Not only can you use it to remove a bolt, you
can use to tighen one too.
|4.2.08 @ 5:21PM|#
Well, not exactly, since Bank of America ain't going to put
you in jail for not paying your car payment.
No, they'll simply reposesses your car. If you took out a signature
loan, they might seize your assets. That's because the contract you
entered into with Bank of America does not include such penalties
as jail -- just assest seizure and perhaps fines.
Since Banks deal with money and assets, is there any surprise their
punishments for breach of contract revolve around money and assets?
They'd prefer the money, but they'll take what you spent it on if
they have to.
Government uses money as a punishment as well -- but it does have
problems in other areas, where fines are either not appropriate or
not effective.
I do find it amusing that someone decided my stance was "America,
Love it or Leave it". Hardly --- I applaud change.
I just deplore the stupidtiy of "taxation is theft".
|4.3.08 @ 6:01AM|#
If you are unfortunate enough to have to make estimated tax
payments (form 1040-ES), you will learn firsthand how involuntary
the system is. If you fail to make a scheduled payment on time, you
will owe an interest penalty based on the amount of time that
elapses until you finally pay the tax, even if, when all is said
and done, the government ends up owing YOU a refund on April 15th.
In my book, having to pay a fine because you failed to make an
interim payment that, in view of a subsequent net refund, was not
even necessary does not qualify as "voluntary." A voluntary system
would advise you that making the interim payments would be in your
best interest to avoid "sticker shock" on April 15th, but there
would be no penalties for not making those payments if you settled
everything up by April 15th. That's not how the system works now,
so it is anything BUT voluntary.
Of course, if you keep records and fill out several forms, you can
avoid penalties for non-payment of estimated tax during periods in
which your income fluctuated in an uncertain fashion: for instance,
if you were out of work for several months, during which an
estimated tax payment based on your previous year's liability came
due. But to fill out forms to plead hardship before our federal
masters is adding insult to the income injury, it seems to me. We
can't scrap the income tax and the 16th amendment fast enough to
suit me.
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