>>221022I just woke up so I'm not sure if this argument is entirely salient or what but here's my justification for taxation
Taxation is obviously necessary to some degree for the functioning of society. Unless you're an anarchist you'll agree that we need some minimal level of taxation.
Moving a step lower, we should also be able to agree that taxation is necessary to prevent corporate monopolization; without any checks on corporate growth, they'd be free to keep the billions of dollars they earn and allocating them towards strangling small businesses.
>but that's their right to do in a free market!This ^ is a corporate boot licker point because it ignores the fact that corporations are not your friends and monopolies almost invariably lead to anti-comsumer practices.
So now we have a justification for taxing
• The common person
• The corporation
The question becomes "how much"?
The way I see it, the more functioning government services a state provides, to the satisfaction of the people as a cohort and in general, the more justified they are in demanding taxes for those services. The argument could be made that that's a buyer-seller relationship you can't opt out of, and thus unfair, but taxes are the price you pay to an entity in order to procure the right to live on the land they own. Even when you buy land, you're just leasing it for an indefinite amount of time from the government rather than a landlord. This is why private property doesn't become its own sovereign country upon purchase.
Don't like that arranmeeperent? That's the terms your country has set, and that's its right to do in a free market. It controls all of the real estate, so it gets to decide the rent. That's capitalism. If it bugs you that much, take your business elsewhere and move. If a corporation owned all the land, they'd do the same exact thing and tax the hell out of you, except they wouldn't have to worry about elections so it'd probably be worse lol. But then it'd be good when they do it because they call themselves a corporation and not a government, right?
Sorry for being snarky, but what's really the difference between taxes (an evil trick by the ZOG to siphon money from hard-work'n red-blooded people) and a subscription service (a completely fair and intelligent market strategy for addressing the changing times and market)? Like I said, you're paying for the right to live in that country. That's capitalism. Like I said before, you don't like it, you're free to take your business elsewhere. May I suggest one of the "socialist" countries?
>Highest POSSIBLE state income tax, assuming you're Scrooge McDuck:<*Note, these numbers go up with certain other conditions, for example, the actual number Scrooge McDuck would pay in Finland is closer to 48 or so, factoring things in like the contribution to his employee health insurance. It could go up to 57 if some really niche conditions are met, such as being a member of the clergy in the Orthodox church, but I doubt you're an Orthodox priest and I don't think you have Scrooge McDuck money in any case.>Finland: 44.25%>Norway: 47.4%>inb4 b-but those are SMALL countries! they can afford to tax people less! what about Canada and the US, large, densely populated countries!?Okay, let's look at France, a large, densely populated country with a robust social safety net.
>45%
<*Note: These are numbers from Google. I looked up the highest possible tax rate and subtracted all the super specific bullshit (like being a part of the clergy in Finland). Let me know if I accidentally fudged my numbers.Seems like things are working out better for the commies than for us. I wonder why that is.
Come to think of it, I don't know how things work in Canada, I've been told your government is marginally better at putting tax dollars to work, but the main issue I have with taxation in America is that it seems like nothing ever gets fucking done with them. I never see new rail lines getting built or actual maintenance getting done, so it makes me wonder where all the money I pay into this agreement goes. My mind immediately goes to embezzlement or corporate subsidies, but maybe there's just something I'm not aware of. I'd have no problem whatsoever with 55% if it meant the government would actually help both me and others, but I still see homeless people, I still see politicians talking about how we just can't afford to help them, I still see people not able to afford day care and so on and so forth, so wtf is happening to all that money I send to Uncle Sam? Just something to research, I suppose.
One last thing before I wrap up.
>the government takes my wages to put them towards an underclass, doomed green policy, ethnic replacement, policy leading to inflation, nothing goodtherefore taxation is obviously immoral
If that's how you see it, I don't think anything I say is going to convince you. If the idea of people who have more chipping in to help those who have less is inherently evil to you, there's no argument to be had and this isn't even a subject worth debating, because you've made it an intrinsic moral question rather than a policy one, and it's a fool's errand to try to change your fundamental beliefs about the world. I'd just post that capitalist societies stratify over time. We're already seeing the erosion of the middle class. One day, depending on the rate of stratification, you may be the 99%. You might lose all your money tomorrow. I wonder if, then, you'll be too proud to take any of the hands extended to you. I wonder if you'll sneer at the others who take food stamps and subsidized housing. Just something to gnaw on.