It’s tax season, my favourite time of year. This season the government has taken a substantial chunk of my wealth i.e.: time and energy. I got creamed on my personal taxes after already paying an insane amount throughout the year and my corporate taxes are no better with more increases coming. It occurred to me last night I am my own worst enemy. I decided to take the risk and make something out of nothing. I have been successful but in doing so I am helping to enable a system I view as immoral and corrupt. For the privilege of being raped for my effort I am allowed to pay for other people’s free ride as well as governmental corruption. I beginning to view myself as an enabler.
So here is my question (it is a moral one): Is it right to labor and build knowing full well that the fruits of your labour will be used against you and to support a system of dependency and servitude? I am torn. And fed up. Have at it.
FM says, “I am beginning to view myself as the enabler”………
What do you mean “beginning”? If you have just reached this conclusion, something is wrong.
I can feel a little better about my servitude Francis because at least we just keep Oreo, the FSA and Congress up with our labor, Canadians have the pleasure of knowing they keep up that bunch of freeloading putrid, worthless Royals in addition. That would really chap my ass on tax day if I were you.
Your dindu royal Queen owns 85 castles and YOU help pay for that……….sick. REVOLT!
Shrug.
“Shrug.” ——— Robert Gore
That’s kind of an asshole-ish response. How would you like that response on something you took the time time and effort to post? A little respect for TBPers who post articles …. is that too much to ask?
Bea Lever
Fuck off. Castles are AWESOME!!!!!
Stucky- Fine, then why don’t you pay part of Francis’ tribute money to help those poor royals keep up those AWESOME castles?
Castles are awesome but the Queen can suck a large root IMO.
Bea
Don’t misunderstand me …. I absolutely DESPISE Royalty. Hang ’em ALL !!!
However, if Francis sends me his home address, I will gladly send him five bucks to help maintain them there castles.
Francis – always manage your life/work within the confines of the rules for your country. So YES, it is A-OK to be an ‘enabler’ in your view.
I’m with you Francis Marion. I did not consent to all these taxes, socialized medicine, paying to school other people’s kids, endless regulations, or importation of lesser cultures that will only hurt the Canadians already here. I’m tired of being stuck paying for government services I don’t want or need, nor would I ever pay for if it was up to me. The problem is, I don’t know how to not work hard; it’s just not in my nature.
The choice to withdraw my consent and participation the the system seems to be the only way I can do something, but it’s not so easy to just stop….or maybe it is just that easy to stop…it’s reaching the decision to actually do it that’s not so easy.
Francis,
If you are well enough off, sell it all and move to Belize. The official language is English, small population and you can buy ON THE BEACH for 300K.
“I am beginning to view myself as the enabler”
(Kinda late to the party, aren’t you?)
I retired early, at 50. I’d had more than enough. The goal was to get out from under the mortgage-indebtedness. That was a big goal and once accomplished, the game was called. At 62, I’m still gainfully unemployed. I didn’t (and don’t) take food stamps or any such FSA benefits or handouts. I’m am,though, just starting my SS benefits that were forcibly paid-for by me through the years. If I hadn’t been forced to pay into it, I would not accept them. I will pay taxes on those benefits, though….the circle of forever.
I’m still pissed that the system isn’t just rigged, it’s a damn lie. So many of us worked really hard and we did things the right way. In the end, all we did was we paid-to-play. What have we got to show for decades of hard work now?
I’ve been encouraging my husband to retire early but he’s more Conservative about being ‘responsible’ than I am. I point out he is more ‘responsible’ towards the FSA than I am. But in fairness, he is cautious due to the health care situation that is fucking everyone from every available orifice. So he still pays-to-play and we have health insurance. He is planning to retire in 14 months — when he turns 62. He said that is the target for him and though he’s completely disgusted at funding/enabling the FSA to continue their way of life, he isn’t willing to destroy the little he (we) have left to prove a point. Or whatever.
My husband is more tolerant of his growing anger at our corrupt system than I am. I am looking for ways to screw-the-system back: REBELLION. RESISTANCE. LEGAL INSURRECTION. Slowly, I have won over my husband….or perhaps the system is continuing to morph into more visibly obnoxious corruption and abuse than he can handle. LOL
The best ways to rebel involves unplugging from the system to the best of your ability.
Rebellion means setting up perimeters that prevent the enemy’s ystem-creep from invasion:
Do not allow “the media” to infect the mind
Divest all ‘capital investments’, go as liquid as possible
Stop consuming stuff
If an item is necessary, buy USED (buy from other individuals, avoid sales tax)
REPAIR broken items
Do not buy China-made junk
Grow as much food as you can eat (and more!)
Invest in yourself, your family, and PMs
Ban Wall Street Corruption
Pass on knowledge and skills to the younger generations.
In essence, rebellion means SIMPLIFY. Unplug. Go grey.
Bea writes:
“What do you mean “beginning”?”
To be honest Bea for years I viewed myself as simply another of many tax donkeys. And I am. I am by no means alone or special (why do you think I spend time here?) but lately I am thinking the problem is more _me_ than the system. I think what you’re saying to me is “yah? so?” which is fair but I suspect you’ve got 15 to 30 years on me which adds perspective too… and leaving the country is not an option for me – I have a child with health issues that has closed that door pretty much indefinitely. So here I am. I will say something here I have not said to anyone anywhere else. I am burned out. I’ve had it with the return on my time, the growing power of every level of state around me and the “there’s nothing wrong here” attitude of the majority of people who live in and around me as well. However, I recognize all of this is my problem and only I can change it to any degree.
Robert says “Shrug”
Stucky gave you a hard time but it’s a fair response. It’s been my mantra for nearly a decade now.
What got me thinking about this was HSF’s comments on seven year cycles. I am at one – a sort of personal fourth turning I guess. I am ready for a change. To some degree I need to become unburdened of the world I am currently living in (one of my own making?) and closer to something else.
@ Stucky,
All you have to do to donate to the Queen is drive across the line and spend some money. A portion of everything penny you spend goes directly to the crown. Go save the Queen! 🙂
“Is it right to labor and build knowing full well that the fruits of your labour will be used against you and to support a system of dependency and servitude?”
Your tax also goes towards the war on terra, war on drugs, war on poverty etc., pays for the militarisation of the cops, the billions of rounds they’ve stockpiled, the abortion of one in four pregnancies, EBT cards, pentagon waste, banker bailouts, bla bla bla.
Given that tax is theft and participation is voluntary, I should think the whole thing’s a no brainer. And if you do the right thing, you’d be in good company, since Jesus was a tax protester. Just be prepared for similar treatment (towards which you contribute also). How big are your balls?
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I.C.
Thanks for writing. Everything you have written has been running through my head over and over as of late. It occurred to me a few weeks ago that if I sold my shares in the company in which I am a partner I could pay off my mortgage early (I am 20 years your junior) and have zero debt. That would be a good start. The question is – what next? Haven’t got that one answered quite yet. I can’t quit working and I’ll need to do something. I’d enjoy going Hardscrabble but land here is so expensive it is not an option. 5 acres with a modest home will run me a cool million or more so forget it. Some would suggest I leave but I can’t – my kid gets the health care here she needs to have a healthy, basically normal life. There is a way but somewhere in between. Just not sure what it is yet. All I know is I am tired of being an enabler… 🙂
Walt,
I’m aware of the tax protest movement. I’m not an American though and all of the tax protesters that I know of here are either destroyed or rotting away in jail cells. Taxes in the peoples republic to the north are definitely NOT voluntary. As for my balls – that’s a pretty personal question even for TBP…..
Minimize your taxes, don’t evade them.
There are all sorts of legitimate ways to do that, it may take a bit of effort but you can cut your taxes to the bone for your tax bracket if you structure your work and income sources properly.
And there is nothing illegal or questionable about it as long as you follow the existing rules and regulations, the IRS will even advise you on the legitimacy of anything you do and help you do it if you ask them.
“Given that tax is theft and participation is voluntary,”
That presumes a big ‘given’. Paying taxes isn’t voluntary at all for those who work as employees, except in the sense that they volunteer our own time and effort to file a return.
To FM, the way I see it is that I work in order to reach a goal of providing for my family and for myself. Being robbed by taxing authorities isn’t enabling them, it’s incidental to my goal, not part of the goal. Staying out of jail and avoiding danger to my family is just part of the means toward the end of reaching my goal.
” I am burned out. ” ——– Francis Marion
Welcome to the club!!
Someone call me when the shooting starts. In the meantime, I suspect I.C.’s advice to — “SIMPLIFY. Unplug. Go grey.” —- if at all possible for you (and, all of us), is spot on.
Stuck – it just occurred to me that Robert’s comment was metaphorical. LOL. As in go Gault. I’m glad to know I’m not the only slow one in the room.
Like IC said in the last paragraph, get out of the system as much as possible. Use only cash and buy used. No investments that can be tracked with exception of your residence. Only own older used vehicles without a loan. Every bit you reduce obviously reduces the tax collected.
The system is going to crash on its own and it will be soon. Most of the peon citizens will lose their retirement accounts, health coverage, job, and residence. And although the goobermint likes to project power they are powerless. The systems/agencies will be overwhelmed and collapse.
We will soon be Venezuela.
The taxation system- income specifically- is designed to be gamed. It doesn’t take a degree or even an accountant, it does however require that you alter your lifestyle in order to beat it.
The calculation should always be set up so that whatever your earnings are can be offset by write-offs for business expenses. You will have a far more difficult time of it if you are an employee, but if you don’t mind self employment, enjoy improving your surroundings with your surplus and don’t mind living a life with fewer luxuries than there is virtually no reason to actually have to pay into the system. Not possible with property taxes of course, but then I have zero problem contributing to my local economy and think of it more as a cost for services rendered/available 24/7
I dropped out of the organized world in 1979 and made my avocations my business. Did pretty well, actually. I put the accumulated “wealth” into tax-free municipals. That interest income and Social inSecurity are my only income–and standard deductions mean no income tax to pay.
So now I’m an ancient widower with a low overhead. No debt. Not a go-to-the-circus happy world, but I have no grounds for complaint.
Francis…… I hear ya!! When I was your age I too woke up to find that when I combined all the taxes I had to pay, it worked out to almost 50% (B.C. every province is a little different)
What can you do?
Nothing…… when you strolled down to the government office to get your SIN number, you were done!
You volunteered to pay taxes!! Starting a business? … you volunteered to get raped by every level of government (there are 5).
They don’t teach this in schools…….. this is the school of life (experience).
If your business don’t have an auditor/advisor….. get one!! Their worth every penny spent!!
Good news!!! once you retire, it gets a lot easier. Still have to pay taxes, but significantly less.
Keep posting Francis….. love your articles
Stucky,
I said shrug for two reasons. The allusion to Atlas Shrugged is obvious, and I said it because it’s basically what I’ve done. I will not feed my destroyers. I wasn’t trying to be callous, and I’ve left my share of lengthier comments on TBP. In this case, I thought one word sufficed. So did Francis Marion. It sounds close to simplifying, unplugging, and going grey, which you commended.
Francis,
Okay…so you’re stuck in the system. But you know what?? Stop thinking of yourself as an ‘enabler’. You are a hero to that child of yours. You are providing the very BEST for your child, given the health issues and the current (and probably only) system you have to choose from.
I would wager that most of us would do the same thing if we were you.
In a way, we are ALL enabling the corrupt system by being law-abiding American citizens. We are obeying laws during a WROL situation within our own government — we are doing so at a time when most who recognized this much corruption would organize and become the second-phase of that famous III% group of dissidents and rebels back in the late 1700s.
So what say you re-define yourself from ‘enabler’ to ‘hero’ ? Yeah, HERO –because you are giving as much as you can to your child. How much more responsible can you be??
And to satisfy your interest and need to buck the system as best as you can, why not sell out half of your company shares. See how it feels to turn paper ‘worth’ (based on forecasted growth and promises during a bleak recessionary time). See how it will feel to be less encumbered financially. That would be a big step towards helping to set yourself free of the sense that you are enabling the system we’ve grown to despise.
into less
Tuck faxes! Whithdrew from the system shortly after ritiring at age 39 and haven’t filed for years. They get fuckall from me. I’m Not enabling the goobermint to bring moo slims and chaos to the USSA. Burnt out on the endless trauma based mind control fetid sputum the eminates from everywhere. Walmart freaks. copfux. feral pavment apes. Kim Mudsharkian, Hitlery, Holder, Odildo, all of them. What a fucking shitshow everything is.
I would divest myself out of taxable investments and events where possible and minimize the enabling of your masters.
Godspeed to you and yours FM.
Bea Lever said:
“Your dindu royal Queen owns 85 castles and YOU help pay for that………”
Rumor has it that the Queen of England owns the corporation known as WASHINGTON D.C. and if true, it means that you are paying for them too.
It’s ok though. If you travel to the UK you can stand outside and look at all of them for free or pay a fee to look inside.
IS – I’ve never had the time or energy to do the research but I’ve always thought it likely that the Queen has far more power than we care to admit. She is technically still the head of state here (Canada is a constitutional monarchy) and although we call her a ‘figurehead’ I suspect she is less figure and more head if you catch my drift. I am sure people with more knowledge on the topic could speak better to it than I could…
Robert Gore
Well, #fuckmedead. I totally missed the Atlas reference. My bad. So solly. Carry on.
Frances Marion,
Lots of good advice here about reducing your tax footprint in any way possible–legally. I’m not quite ready to land in the Big House for tax evasion or I’d just stop filing and paying.
But the best advice here is I.C.’s regarding being a hero to your child. Amen!
I basically went Gault last October. Bought a small place in Tennessee where we can sustain ourselves. I have no debt and easily offset our retirement and farm income with proper business investments in ourselves.
It’s not that hard to do if you truly want to rid yourself of supporting the man.
Life is simpler and filled with hard work and productive days. I am at a much greater peace than I have been in years.