I believe taxation is theft. I do not believe the tax payer owes the society anything, if anything the tax payer who made the money satisfied society’s demand money is just a reward. it is unfair and unjust to take what someone has legitamately earned and give it to others who have not earned it.
Please correct me.
PoR
Another confused person. Taxes is not theft as we
have made a contract with society. If you accept the
advantages of society, I.E. schooling, roads, bridges,
sewage plants, mililtary, police, firemen, hospitals, and
I am sure I missed some, anyway, if you use those
services and who in america doesn’t then you must
also help pay for those services. Don’t like it, then move
to someplace where they don’t have any services of any
kind, say the wilderness of borneo. You won’t have to pay
any taxes of any kind living there in the wilderness. However,
I suggest you watch out for cannibals. You want to get services,
you got to pay for them. There is no free lunch.
Kropotkin
I believe whoever earned their income deserve their income. Taxation is basically society’s way of saying their income is too high. if that is the case then why pay them the high income in the first place??
Let’ take a hypothetical example.
If a person earns 100 per week due to his service as a fireman. Now society decide to tax 10% of his earning per week so in total he gets 90.
Now if his contribution to society is only 90 then why did society pay him 100 in the first place? what is a fair wage? is it 90 or 100???
Society does need law and order, all the civil provisions, but it does not need those on social welfare. if taxation involves a transfer payment to those on social welfare then it becomes theft because it involves paying those who did not earn it!
Strange you use that phrase Mr. Kropotkin.
Nullum gratuitum prandium is a version of paying the piper … or more to the point … both PoR and you are correct.
One does not necessarily request to be part of the society, and therefore accept the services, and strictly speaking, under the auspices of the Screw Deals I & II, a great number of taxes were levied against the populace without their consent, knowledge or agreement …
If you accept the social contract, you accept paying. But whether or not you accept the social contract, you are having tax money stolen from you for services you don’t receive, and probably aren’t aware of …
Comedic irony, in either instance.
Taxes should be voluntary, like a restaraunt menu. Those services you dont want to pay for you dont have to pay taxes for.
That way Old TImer could realize that paying no taxes means he would have to call the 900 number at $10 per minute to talk to the police and put a quarter in the loo before he could flush it and pay a toll at every street corner, walking and driving.
Ahh the wonder of a tax free society.
I think it is sad that Old timer believes the tax payer owes nothing to society, it shows a disassociation from the reality of what society is and does, for not only him, but everyone who enjoys it.
You may be uncomfortable with how your tax dollars are being spent, but as they are gathered legally, this is not an incident of theft.
If all of what you say is true, then it would seem like we would all be paying “equal amounts” of taxes. The problem, of course, is that not everyone truly pays for these services and others pay for more than their fair share.
Why is it that someone who makes say, a billion dollars, should get by paying less tax than someone who makes 80,000 a year? It can be done because the person with a billion can invest in things that aren’t taxable by virtue of having more money–not to mention affording good accountants.
To the extent that money limits people in the way they pay taxes, it is a kind of robbery. I’m sure if we all had our druthers, we’d all be millionaires. As far as I can tell, the people who ARE millionaires really haven’t done anything to warrant having that sort of money. Is inventing an operating system somehow harder and therefore worth more money than the mom who works two jobs to take care of her kids? I don’t get it.
Was that a slam at Bill Gates, the guy who has donated billions to charitable causes?
LOL, get out of the media circus, those facts are highly muddled.
The largest amounts of donations to “charitable institutions” have come from sources other than Gates, by proxy of actual philanthropic individuals using his leverage to gain media attention for a cause.
As for the money he has paid, it doesn’t cover the lost jobs and wages he has caused by illegal means, to all the smaller companies from which almost all of the Windows utilities were stolen, or appropriated through less than ethical/legal means.
Gates is a primordial scumbag, and if he takes a deer slug to the face, I get a good chuckle for poetic justice.
Why is he a deer hunter too? 
My point is that the tax payer has already contributed to society by his personal exertion. for example, a labour already made contribution to society by doing work for society. but society then taxes on his income. which is another way of saying the society changes its mind and that the labour originally got paid too much.
I believe taxation is ok in small societies, like villages, where you can actually see how money is being spend.
In our humungous society, no one knows where the tax dollar is going. it is like someone idiot sending you a bill and all you do is to pay it and not know what the heck it is for? isn’t that a bit ridiculous?
especially when you found out it is to pay for some dole bludger!!!
Most of the exertion taxpayers go through is for their own benefit, not the benefit of society.
Example, a barber may do a wonderful job providing haircuts, but it does not help in the least improve or maintain the infrastructure of society. The money he recieves for the haircuts he provides is a fair wage. If it weren’t his customers would go elsewhere. To ‘get out’ of doing something for society so that he may pursue his onw interests he pays taxes, that others may perform the services society needs that he doesn’t want to provide.
Very ridiculous, but what are you going to do. If you want to feel better about it, research where the money is going. Look into the organizations that recieve your money, how they are organized, and how they spend you money. You may even want to see how much it would cost to have private contractors do the same work.
Consider it insurance against the ills of the discontented. Poverty is a terrible thing, it gives rise to all sort of unpleasantness. By allowing ‘dole bludgers’ to live a relatively content life you may remove from some of them the need to rationalize antisocial behaviour like mugging, theft, robbery, etc.
If taxation is theft then universal schooling is wrong.
Whose law does taxation infringe upon? The individual’s? Do you know how to test food for poison, dismantle a bomb, make sure an airplane flies safely, operate a fire truck, pave a street, build a city, provide electricity, build a house, clean water, maintain hospitals, research technologies, and engage in the multitudes of other activities that the government of society does and you in turn take for granted? Those are the things you’re paying taxes for, and many of them would easily be swallowed in competition and deceit without government regulation. It is very much in the individual’s interests to participate in society, and while the nature of our existance provides for inefficiencies and mistakes along with the benefits of government, it is clearly superior to the currently viable alternatives.
You can complain about the philosophical ambiguity of an implicit social contract all you’d like, but society’s structure is such today that these can be overcome, whereas demanding an immediate abolishment of state supremacy at this time clearly disregards the limits of our capacity for peace and fairness, not to mention production, and regresses our movement toward a more clearly and justly principled community. As it stands, government and taxes are a necessary “evil.”
Sadly, the government doesn’t really know how to do those things, either. Doesn’t stop 'em from taxing us for it. 
Suppose I dont accept this contract the goverment offers , I accept my own . I will use the water , toilets , parks , bridges and things like that for free , and try as best I can to dodge paying up for these services .
Since under my contract it states that its wrong to go to war over nothing , over something I disagree with , and mislead people , to lie and behave dishonorably , I see no wrong in taking from those who would take without our consent , and abuse the rights of others . Two wrongs dont make a right ? But Im not wrong , they are .
They accuse me of being a freeloader , but I accuse them , the goverment and all those people who dont have any morals in society of being dishonest and corrupt . So how can I feel bad about “cheating” those who are already cheaters , when Im someone who is honest and trustworthy ?
Why should there be anything wrong with just taking ? Like they took from the Native americans , the scots , the Africans , the Indians , when it suited them . And now in 2006 , they still refuse to put right those wrongs . To compensate these people for the horror they have had to endure .
If they put them right I,ll conform . If not , I,ll continue living as I please , and ignore them , and their demands that I should live as a “model” citizen . Since by conforming , I instantly become less moral .
I dont hurt other citizens really by choosing not to pay some , or all my bills , this is just lies that we,ve been fed to make us snitch on people we suspect are not “conforming” , like in Berlin during Hitlers regime , or to encourage us to attack one another and create division . There,s more than enough cash in this world to help sustain things , owned and controlled by wealthy business men , goverment leaders , all with the same interests , their vanity .
Billions are spent on irrelevant things every year which I dont agree with , that money was created through the economy which flourished when the slave trade kicked off , hence the reason whites everywhere are generally wealthier and more content than Negros and asians . So Even the money we have to squander in the west is,nt technically ours . I,ll render to the goverment whats theirs
.