Eisenhower's 92% tax rate
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Since when is conservatism about a regressive tax system? Since when do conservatives not care for the poor?
Again, you are catering conservatism to what you believe, but maybe after all you aren't as conservative as you thought you were. It is a silly political moniker either way. And either way, what makes you the sole defender of all things good? Maybe Friedman deeply believed in it. Also, to you did Stigler fall to the same trap Friedman did? How far do you dig this hole to convince yourself you are right?
Reagan supported the EITC, an idea that is very similar to and often seen as a child of Friedman and Stigler's negative income tax. He once called the Tax Reform bill “perhaps the biggest antipoverty program in our history.” - presumably because we was able to get the EITC expansion through.
You hide your thefts behind a facade of caring. Nice touch.
If governments are not constrained by written constitutions or charters then whatever is being practiced is not conservatism.
It is never ethical to steal from one person to give to another. And yet that is what you are pushing. I cannot tell what some economists, even those I largely agree with had in mind but theft is always theft.
It is very simple for me. If you come to me to steal from me I will stop you. I will use whatever force is necessary up to and including deadly force. So you turn to politicians to do your stealing for you. At some point this leads to revolutions.
I am confident that you will always be able to find someone who will make an argument that a little theft is a good thing. It is still theft. It is not a conservative position even if someone with a reputation for being conservative pushes for it.
You know you toss out your little one-liners with no context and little evidence. I am not convinced.
Look at the man's whole life. It was not about taxing the rich in order to give to the poor. It was consistently about restraining government and reducing its interference and its power over us.
You do him an injustice.
Actually you do him and good people like Milton Friedman an injustice by twisting them into the cold-hearted zombies you want them to be. You can reject the proof but push comes to shove, he SIGNED a bill that EXPANDED the EITC by a lot. And there is no denying that Friedman and Stigler were proponents of the negative income tax; you are just ignoring facts to suggest otherwise.
Also, you keep talking about theft. What theft? To suggest that everyone gets the same benefit from government is ignoring basic economics- the free rider problem, for one. Beyond that, a HIGHER tax on the poor than the rich might be viewed as theft as per your definition too
Plunder keeps the left (almost) happy.
Of course it is theft. And it now borders on slavery. For if you can demand that I turn over the value of four hours out of every ten hours I work for the benefit of another then what else could it be?
I think your leftist eyes see what they want to see. Just for fun this morning I watched about a dozen You Tube videos of Milton Friedman. The shortest one was about five minutes. The longest was just under an hour. He discussed the negative income tax with two arguments. The first is to treat everybody equally before the law. The second was to reduce the size of government. I suspect you did not recognize either argument.Actually you do him and good people like Milton Friedman an injustice by twisting them into the cold-hearted zombies you want them to be. You can reject the proof but push comes to shove, he SIGNED a bill that EXPANDED the EITC by a lot. And there is no denying that Friedman and Stigler were proponents of the negative income tax; you are just ignoring facts to suggest otherwise.
Also, you keep talking about theft. What theft? To suggest that everyone gets the same benefit from government is ignoring basic economics- the free rider problem, for one. Beyond that, a HIGHER tax on the poor than the rich might be viewed as theft as per your definition too
Of course it is theft. And it now borders on slavery. For if you can demand that I turn over the value of four hours out of every ten hours I work for the benefit of another then what else could it be?
Actually, I am for both and is why I support progressive taxation too... YOU are the one that does not want to treat everyone equally.
Do you believe in government or are you an anarchist? If it is the former, you know you need to tax or tariff or something to pay for a military and basic government, function, right?
Paying for military and other expenses is fine. But buying the most expensive and extravagant things such as I phones for people that are to lazy to work is another. If you wasn't more money trim the fat, don't just consume more.
I completely disagree with using taxes to redistribute wealth. Using it to create an environment where jobs are available more so is great. But it seems the last couple of decades the government has used tax money to thwart growth by regulating away profit margins.
I am very much an anarchist if the goal of the government is to redistribute wealth as they see fit. Because they will favor those that elect them. It all comes down to the motive.
My greater point was that you can't call all taxing theft, when you yourself want to tax (unless you admit that you are for government theft, I guess).
We really haven't got a choice, we ate held at gunpoint and our earnings are confiscated.
One thing we could do, just nobody pay taxes for a month, the government couldn't prosecute anyone because they would have no money.
I can call stealing money from those that work hard to give extravagant gifts to the ungrateful criminal element theft.
Continued pointless wars all about the globe to polish poor egos, is a heavy burden on folks also.
You didn't address my point. You call it theft when I advocate for a tax, but then you support the existence of the state, so I assume you support taxes too, no?
Theft is a word to get people politically-charged. There is no place for it as a synonym in intellectual discussion. Especially, economically, if you consider the uneven uses of public goods, then I can say those using it less are also committing a form of theft. It is just silly once you go down that path. We know there are free rider problems and a gradient that goes with that.
Taxes to support extra-constitutional programs are theft
This is why we need and must abide by written Constitutions. If it is not in the Constitution that taxing to pay for it is theft. So is printing and borrowing the money. The only difference is the theft mechanism, its victims and timing.
...Uh...We have moved beyond the constitution, when discussing it?
We steal from ourselves every time we spend money on our military, Roads, bridges, social security, medicare, or virtually anything currently in place?
And....our Democratic Republic is actually a Tyranny?
Seriously, even the Conspiracy forum would find your comments ....out there.
The SCOTUS has determined what is not and is not Constitutional when it is challenged. It is not up to you to decide. But I am not going down this discussion with you again- let's stay on the tax topic please.
I'd like to add that you can't disagree with the SCOTUS's interpretations as the Constitution spells it out (literally) quite clearly that they and they alone have the authority and responsibility to determine Constitutionality. If they say it's Constitutional then as per the Constitution, it is.
Sparring with Straw Men
Every dollar printed, borrowed or taxed and spent on things not enumerated in the Constitution are a theft from today's taxpayers or from the next generation's tax payers.
Social security certainly is theft. It is the same with medicare. Today there are many extra-constitutional departments and agencies.
When we are prevented from doing what we want to do by coercive government power that goes beyond our Constitution we are experiencing tyranny. We have a massive regulatory state. Much of it is tyrannical.
I understand your desire to spar with straw men of your own making.
Every dollar printed, borrowed or taxed and spent on things not enumerated in the Constitution are a theft from today's taxpayers or from the next generation's tax payers.
Social security certainly is theft. It is the same with medicare. Today there are many extra-constitutional departments and agencies.
When we are prevented from doing what we want to do by coercive government power that goes beyond our Constitution we are experiencing tyranny. We have a massive regulatory state. Much of it is tyrannical.
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