Taxation is Coercion

[MisanthropicPopulism]

A. Public sector employees make significantly more than private sector employees. B. Transfer programs are filled with fraud.

A. I presume you have useless research studies to prove that public sector employees on average make more than private sector employees doing the same jobs,
B. Congratulations. You identified fraud. Next you will tell me private industry doesn't have it. And if I question it, you will say it is because of strict regulation [by the government]

How the fuck are they useless?

Oh sorry, the word was "ridiculous."

Accountants, nurses, chemists, surveyors, cooks, clerks and janitors are among the wide range of jobs that get paid more on average in the federal government than in the private sector.

Overall, federal workers earned an average salary of $67,691 in 2008 for occupations that exist both in government and the private sector, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data. The average pay for the same mix of jobs in the private sector was $60,046 in 2008, the most recent data available.

These salary figures do not include the value of health, pension and other benefits, which averaged $40,785 per federal employee in 2008 vs. $9,882 per private worker, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/201 ... -pay_N.htm
A total of $108,476 compared to $69,928. Paid for with taxes paid by the ones earnings less.

That's not really what I asked for.

The private sector has less fraud, because they have a profit motive.

Oh. OF COURSE. Because no one has ever made a penny from fraud.

Estimates for Medicare fraud is about 12%. With margins in single digits, that is simply not possible.

And Medicare has what? Fraction of the administrative costs the private industry has?

[Sibirsky]

Well continue the circle, because I get the impessionthe circle has just come to an end since you have no rebuttal to offer.

So you are saying that you, personally, can get cheaper drugs than the government negotiating as an entity representing millions of people?

Are you talking about drug prices specifically?

Considering that was a full half of what you were saying you would have the money for, yes.

Evidence shows that people with HSAs pay less for doctor visits than people paying through insurance.

[Kazomal]

Damn government always stealing my money... and then using it to provide me services...

That I don't use/need.

Yes you do. By not living in a state of nature, you use the services the government provides.

By using any medicine aside from herbs you grow or barter for, you are benefiting from living in a civil society. It is because we live in a civil society that the knowledges and skills of the human race can be preserved and improved on.

The fact that most people have a job that isn't "highwayman" or "robber" is a achievement of civil society.

Schools that preserve and pass on human knowledge is a achievment of a civil society.

The freedom from diseases that have been wiped out or suppressed is an achievement of a civil society.

The fact that we have money, rather than just goods to barter, an a system for building up and using capital, is an achievement of a civil society.

You are not self-sufficient.

Enjoying the benefits of living in a civil society without paying into the upkeep of that society is theft

[MisanthropicPopulism]

Well continue the circle, because I get the impessionthe circle has just come to an end since you have no rebuttal to offer.

So you are saying that you, personally, can get cheaper drugs than the government negotiating as an entity representing millions of people?

Are you talking about drug prices specifically?

Considering that was a full half of what you were saying you would have the money for, yes.

Evidence shows that people with HSAs pay less for doctor visits than people paying through insurance.

"People who pay cash pay less for doctor visits than people who use insurance."
Yes. And people paying for cash can get more for their buck than people using credit pretty much anywhere.

Good thing that has NOTHING to do with what I said.

[Avenio]

You are correct that Theft technically is a legal term that the government defines. So technically, if you want to argue semantics, you are absolutely correct that taxation is not theft. This is something that I have realized from this debate. However, taxation is theft without the legal connotation. If I want to reword it and skip the semantic arguments, I would say that taxation is violent coersion.

How so? 'Theft' is something we define, as a society, to be part of our moral code, which then can reflect on our laws. For example, most people would have a very hard time convincing themselves to steal a DVD from a video store, but can then go home and pirate two dozen movies without even flinching. Both are equally classified under the law as 'theft', but we, as a society, are much more adverse to the theft of physical items than digital. And, in response to this, our laws and society are adapting to this. (Ie music labels are beginning to switch focus from selling CD's to selling concert tickets and movie studios are beginning to focus on parts of the 'movie' experience that cannot be replicated from a pirated version, etc) In twenty years' time, the pirating of digital information may well be fully legalized, and the definition of 'theft' will have changed.

In this manner, taxation has been defined by the majority of our society (Look at NSG, for example; 67% of those responding to the poll think that taxes are not theft and are necessary, and another 17% believe that while taxation is theft, it is necessary for society. That adds up to 84% supporting taxation, and only 10% think taxation is theft and is unnecessary for society.) as not being theft, and, unfortunately, the majority ultimately decides what our collective moral and social code is. Truth, in this case, is very much a relative phenomena.

[Bendira]

Damn government always stealing my money... and then using it to provide me services...

That I don't use/need.

Yes you do. By not living in a state of nature, you use the services the government provides.

By using any medicine aside from herbs you grow or barter for, you are benefiting from living in a civil society. It is because we live in a civil society that the knowledges and skills of the human race can be preserved and improved on.

The fact that most people have a job that isn't "highwayman" or "robber" is a achievement of civil society.

Schools that preserve and pass on human knowledge is a achievment of a civil society.

The freedom from diseases that have been wiped out or suppressed is an achievement of a civil society.

The fact that we have money, rather than just goods to barter, an a system for building up and using capital, is an achievement of a civil society.

You are not self-sufficient.

Enjoying the benefits of living in a civil society without paying into the upkeep of that society is theft

Civil Society /= Government. All of your above statements are based on the assumption that you need a government for a civil society, which I believe has been disproven throughout history.

[MisanthropicPopulism]

Civil Society /= Government. All of your above statements are based on the assumption that you need a government for a civil society, which I believe has been disproven throughout history.

You are welcome to point said times out.

[Bendira]

Civil Society /= Government. All of your above statements are based on the assumption that you need a government for a civil society, which I believe has been disproven throughout history.

You are welcome to point said times out.

Iceland, Early American Settlers, American West.

[Kazomal]

Damn government always stealing my money... and then using it to provide me services...

That I don't use/need.

Yes you do. By not living in a state of nature, you use the services the government provides.

By using any medicine aside from herbs you grow or barter for, you are benefiting from living in a civil society. It is because we live in a civil society that the knowledges and skills of the human race can be preserved and improved on.

The fact that most people have a job that isn't "highwayman" or "robber" is a achievement of civil society.

Schools that preserve and pass on human knowledge is a achievment of a civil society.

The freedom from diseases that have been wiped out or suppressed is an achievement of a civil society.

The fact that we have money, rather than just goods to barter, an a system for building up and using capital, is an achievement of a civil society.

You are not self-sufficient.

Enjoying the benefits of living in a civil society without paying into the upkeep of that society is theft

Civil Society /= Government. All of your above statements are based on the assumption that you need a government for a civil society, which I believe has been disproven throughout history.

Not that a government is necessary for them to exist, but that they all exist now because of government. Whether they could have been done some other way (which I disagree with) is irrelevant, because the society we have now produced them, you use/benefit from them, you gatta pay for it.

Seperatly, if government is not necessary to maintain a civil society, how else would you suggest we maintain one? What historical examples lead you to believe that gov is not necessary for this?

[MisanthropicPopulism]

Civil Society /= Government. All of your above statements are based on the assumption that you need a government for a civil society, which I believe has been disproven throughout history.

You are welcome to point said times out.

Early American Settlers, American West.

With their governors, and mayors, and sheriffs.

[Bendira]

Civil Society /= Government. All of your above statements are based on the assumption that you need a government for a civil society, which I believe has been disproven throughout history.

You are welcome to point said times out.

Early American Settlers, American West.

With their governors, and mayors, and sheriffs.

Theres nothing wrong with governors and mayors as long as they don't levy taxes. If they are just community leaders and they don't violently coerce anyone to give them their money I have nothing against it. And there being sheriffs is actually quite an integral part of anarcho-capitalism. No ancap I have ever talked to has said their shouldn't be police.

Edit: Sorry for the useage of "intrical"

[Kazomal]

All those places involve or involved taxes and government. Additionally, in the case of the American examples, land and resources were not very scarce, and thus resource management wasn't as important. And this was only the case because of constant genocidal war against the natives to conquer the resources of the continent for use by our own society.

[Person012345]

You owe everything to your society. Most countries taxation is generous because it only requires you to give a portion of it.

So by logical conclusion if you are generally nice productive guy who manages to offend one too many people then the community has the right to dispose of your goods as they see fit?

How did you get that from my post? The individual people in a society cannot simply behave however the hell they want. And you don't owe those individual people anything. "Society" is the collective of everyone. And government is what invests in society. Now, I understand there is corruption and so on, but that really can't be helped unless we convert to robocracy. But taxes are to be re-invested into society, which you owe everything. It has nothing to do with the individuals within that society, you don't owe them anything.

In our current systems, the government represents society, it decides what to do with the money. For the purposes of reality you can equate "society" with "government" when responding to my statement. Although they are not really one and the same, the government represents our societies.

Edit: Although a direct democracy for example, the society would decide what to do with the money directly. It's just that that's not the system we operate.

[Bendira]

All those places involve or involved taxes and government. Additionally, in the case of the American examples, land and resources were not very scarce, and thus resource management wasn't as important. And this was only the case because of constant genocidal war against the natives to conquer the resources of the continent for use by our own society.

Its true that non of these places were completely free of government, but since you admit that they would be considered civilized societies, does that now make you a minarchist? The genocidal war part is disgusting but not related to this topic. Im focusing specifically on the gold rush.

[Xomic]

Damn government always stealing my money... and then using it to provide me services...

That I don't use/need.

Like roads, schools, police, national defense, Social Security, Medicare, cheap birthday balloons, etc.

Half of those the private sector would provide better for much cheaper, and half of those I don't want like social security or medicare.

I highly doubt that.

The problem with your reasoning is like this; the median income in the United States is something like 52k. Now, lets assume the government takes half of that in taxes, or around 26k. There is something like 2.7 million miles of paved, public, road in the United States, which mean, with these taxes, you end up paying something like 9/10s of a cent per mile of road. And this doesn't factor in all the other things the government provides, like police or military.

[MisanthropicPopulism]

Theres nothing wrong with governors and mayors as long as they don't levy taxes.

I think you are confused as to what your argument was.

[Bendira]

Theres nothing wrong with governors and mayors as long as they don't levy taxes.

I think you are confused as to what your argument was.

No?

[Bendira]

Damn government always stealing my money... and then using it to provide me services...

That I don't use/need.

Like roads, schools, police, national defense, Social Security, Medicare, cheap birthday balloons, etc.

Half of those the private sector would provide better for much cheaper, and half of those I don't want like social security or medicare.

I highly doubt that.

The problem with your reasoning is like this; the median income in the United States is something like 52k. Now, lets assume the government takes half of that in taxes, or around 26k. There is something like 2.7 million miles of paved, public, road in the United States, which mean, with these taxes, you end up paying something like 9/10s of a cent per mile of road. And this doesn't factor in all the other things the government provides, like police or military.

I dont understand your argument here, or what it intends to prove.

[Kazomal]

listen, I'm not saying that taxes and governments are nessecerry (although I do think that, I won't try to argue it here), all I'm saying is that if you benefit from the structure of this particular society, you have to pay into it, or else you're free riding on everyone else's tax revenue. Thus, tax is not theft. Wether or not those benefits could have come about some other way is irrelevant, this is how they did and do exist, so if you use them, you pay.

What level taxes are at and how they are assessed and collected is another matter entirely.

[Bendira]

listen, I'm not saying that taxes and governments are nessecerry (although I do think that, I won't try to argue it here), all I'm saying is that if you benefit from the structure of this particular society, you have to pay into it, or else you're free riding on everyone else's tax revenue. Thus, tax is not theft. Wether or not those benefits could have come about some other way is irrelevant, this is how they did and do exist, so if you use them, you pay.

What level taxes are at and how they are assessed and collected is another matter entirely.

Do I have an option not to free ride?

[Xomic]

listen, I'm not saying that taxes and governments are nessecerry (although I do think that, I won't try to argue it here), all I'm saying is that if you benefit from the structure of this particular society, you have to pay into it, or else you're free riding on everyone else's tax revenue. Thus, tax is not theft. Wether or not those benefits could have come about some other way is irrelevant, this is how they did and do exist, so if you use them, you pay.

What level taxes are at and how they are assessed and collected is another matter entirely.

Do I have an option not to free ride?

Free riders are bad.

[Hernier]

It intends to prove that the government can provide things cheaply.

[Bendira]

listen, I'm not saying that taxes and governments are nessecerry (although I do think that, I won't try to argue it here), all I'm saying is that if you benefit from the structure of this particular society, you have to pay into it, or else you're free riding on everyone else's tax revenue. Thus, tax is not theft. Wether or not those benefits could have come about some other way is irrelevant, this is how they did and do exist, so if you use them, you pay.

What level taxes are at and how they are assessed and collected is another matter entirely.

Do I have an option not to free ride?

Free riders are bad.

Is that your intelligent argument?

[Hernier]

Iceland, Early American Settlers, American West.

All these places did involve a government of some kind. Iceland the Althing, early american settlers the governors, and the american west the sheriffs, and governors. You will not find a society in the world, past, present, or future without some form of government.

[Xomic]

listen, I'm not saying that taxes and governments are nessecerry (although I do think that, I won't try to argue it here), all I'm saying is that if you benefit from the structure of this particular society, you have to pay into it, or else you're free riding on everyone else's tax revenue. Thus, tax is not theft. Wether or not those benefits could have come about some other way is irrelevant, this is how they did and do exist, so if you use them, you pay.

What level taxes are at and how they are assessed and collected is another matter entirely.

Do I have an option not to free ride?

Free riders are bad.

Is that your intelligent argument?

Oh my yes.

No, an argument would be;
Free riders take from society/government/movement without giving back.
Taking something without giving back is wrong.
Ergo, Free Riders are wrong.