Guest Post by Doug Casey
To eliminate misunderstanding as to what taxes are, it is helpful to define the word “theft.” One good definition is “the wrongful taking and carrying away of the personal goods of another.” The definition does not go on to say, “unless you’re the government.”
There is no difference, in principle, between the State taking property and a street gang doing so, except that the State’s theft is “legal” and its agents are immune from prosecution. Many people do not accept that analogy, because the government is widely viewed as being of, for, and by the people, even though it’s also acknowledged as acting badly from time to time.
Suppose a mugger demanded your wallet, perhaps because he needed money to buy a new car and threatened you with violence if you weren’t forthcoming. Everyone would call that a criminal act. Suppose, however, the mugger said he wanted the money to buy himself food. Would it still be theft? Suppose now that he said he wanted your wallet to feed another hungry person, not himself. Would it still be theft?
Now let’s suppose that this mugger convinces most of his friends that it’s okay for him to relieve you of your wallet. Would it still be theft? What if he convinces a majority of citizens? Principles stand on their own. Even if a criminal act is committed for a good purpose, or with the complicity of bystanders, (even if those people call themselves the government), it is still an act of criminal aggression.
It is important to establish an ethical viewpoint on the matter, even if it doesn’t change your reaction to the mugger’s (or the State’s) demands. Just as it’s usually unwise to resist a mugger, it’s usually unwise to resist the government, which has a lot of force on its side.
That’s not to say it’s easy to swim against the tide. Every year at tax time promoters of big government haul out an assortment of nostrums to sedate the lambs as they are shorn. One of the worst is “Taxes are the price we pay for civilization,” a statement of Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes. It is a splendid example of how, if a lie is big enough and is repeated often enough, it can come to be accepted.
Actually, the truth is almost exactly the opposite. As Mark Skousen, economist and author, has pointed out: “Taxation is the price we pay for failing to build a civilized society. The higher the tax level, the greater the failure. A centrally planned totalitarian state is a complete failure of civilization, while a totally voluntary society is its ultimate success.”
Taxes are destroyers of civilization and society. They impoverish the average man. They support welfare programs that anchor the lower classes at the bottom of society. They underwrite a gigantic bureaucracy that serves only to raise costs and quash incentive. They pay for public works programs (once called “pork barrel projects,” but now rechristened “infrastructure investment”) that are usually ten times more costly than their privately financed counterparts, whether needed or not. They maintain programs that cause huge distortions in the economy (such as deposit insurance for banks). And they foster a climate of fear and dishonesty. The list of evils goes on. But the simple truth is that anything needed or wanted by society would be provided by profit-seeking entrepreneurs, if only the tax collector would retire.
Protesting against taxes because they’re a costly or inefficient way of providing services, however, is in good measure futile. It’s like saying that the mugger shouldn’t rob you because there might be a better way for him to get what he wants.
How serious is the tax problem in the long run? I believe it will become less, not more serious, despite the government’s increasingly high tax rates and draconian enforcement measures. The major long-term trend of society is toward decentralization and smaller-scale organizations. The US government will prove no more able to deal with a rapidly evolving economy than was the Soviet government. More and more Americans will see the government as meaningless and irrelevant, as serving no useful purpose.
It is my sincere desire to provide readers of this site with the best unbiased information available, and a forum where it can be discussed openly, as our Founders intended. But it is not easy nor inexpensive to do so, especially when those who wish to prevent us from making the truth known, attack us without mercy on all fronts on a daily basis. So each time you visit the site, I would ask that you consider the value that you receive and have received from The Burning Platform and the community of which you are a vital part. I can't do it all alone, and I need your help and support to keep it alive. Please consider contributing an amount commensurate to the value that you receive from this site and community, or even by becoming a sustaining supporter through periodic contributions. [Burning Platform LLC - PO Box 1520 Kulpsville, PA 19443] or Paypal
-----------------------------------------------------
To donate via Stripe, click here.
-----------------------------------------------------
Use promo code ILMF2, and save up to 66% on all MyPillow purchases. (The Burning Platform benefits when you use this promo code.)
Nobody disagrees with philanthropy at a donor’s dinner, nobody argues in the pews about tithing, but propose taxation to support indigents… to support “Piss on You” artists?
Time to throw some tea overboard.
Tea is valuable, throw the politicians out a window.
A Holy Trinity of Axioms:
1.) Elephants cannot govern Mice and vice versa. Minimally, time perception variances will distort governance into a tragedy. Big governing small is domineering. Small governing big is puppeteering.
2.) Taxation IS theft. If coercion is necessary, and Non-Aggression Principle was not violated in trade/gains, it’s theft. If it wasn’t theft, voluntary income taxes would fill governments vaults. The opposite is true – NO ONE pays without use of force or threat of and that, in itself, is telling and damning.
3.) Property Rights beat all. Property rights are a self-correcting and self-reincforcing mechanism that brings stability and intetwines with the Non-Aggression Principle by creating boundaries and systems that pre-define what constitutes aggression to another entity’s non-aggressively gained property. Only Tyrants want this destroyed via direct force/coercion, or by political means, like communism/progressives.
The Mexicans disagree. Emphatically.
One of their favorite parable/axioms for getting ahead in life:
“Con mucho saliva y un poco de paciencia, el elefantes puede chingales hormigas!”
With a lot of spit and a little patience, elephants can fuck the ants.
But not entirely. Everybody Knows.
The shagging ends when the ants to stand up for their property rights.
Ha! Right on DD – sincere thanks for keepin’ it lite and cracking me up late on a Friday night!
Wait a minute, our current system of capitalism is doing the same thing. They’re usually recognized as corporate lobbyist and they are from capitalist institutions. So as Doug Casey says, “The government should not be involved in the economy”, then why hasn’t he EVER spoken out against this practice?
Pretty sure most everybody here is for capitalism. Making one’s own money and keeping all of it.
In the sense that governments ALL find a way to steal a piece of the capitalist pie to support those who excoriate capitalism, all governments are anti-capitalist.
Casey isn’t pro central government, or anti-capitalist, he’s a “New Tribalistst” with friends like Jeff Berwick (OK, “Boooooo…!!!” he’s a libertarian athiest, which I can’t even half-swallow, but that doesn’t make his self-anointed mantle, “Financial Freedom Fighters“ a lie):
“Back to tribalism? Or forward to new communities of members freely associating according to their taste? – In “phyles”, to use the Greek word for clans. But not clans in the old sense, not clans bound by kinship or place of birth, but elective clans. You choose the company you want to keep, the type of economy you want to participate in.”
https://theatheistconservative.com/tag/doug-casey/
Huge difference from crony capitalism created corporatocracy , which is what I mentioned. That’s the government involved in the economy. Something Casey hypocritically say’s he’s against. Also he doesn’t seem to mind when the government intervened to bailout the TBTF cocksuckers. Seems he’s got quite a few double standards.
He really is the type that is socialism for the rich and capitalism for everyone else. To Casey, government is good if they can pass more laws that favor the rich, but hey, don’t tax me bro.
I realize Casey is always trying to sell “his book”, and I find him somewhat pompous, but he often offers good information – especially to young people that may just be getting introduced to the more complex concepts regarding econ, fiat currency, and gov interference and competition prevention via regulations, for examples.
I don’t see where you mentioned “crony capitalism” until your last comment. You mentioned lobbyists. Then corporate lobbyists. I don’t see how those are the exact same as “crony capitalism”. People lobby for all kinds of things in a representative republic. So do businesses – from S corps to LLC’s and Sole Prop. and LLP’s. Some Lobby to have crappy laws removed to open competition, as an example.
Then you put up a strawman: “So as Doug Casey says, “The government should not be involved in the economy”, then why hasn’t he EVER spoken out against this practice?”
Did you read the article you are commenting on? It is pointing out the moral/ethical/economic/social intereference and repercussions from the government being “involved in the economy” via taxation – the biggest involvement possible.
Clearly, you have never owned a business or you would know that your BIGGEST partner, that ALWAYS gets paid first, is the Government.
No strawman at all. You didn’t read my comment. Or perhaps you read it but reverse engineered it to your own preferred narrative. I’ll repeat;
Wait a minute, our current system of capitalism is doing the same thing. They’re usually recognized as corporate lobbyist and they are from capitalist institutions. So as Doug Casey says, “The government should not be involved in the economy”, then why hasn’t he EVER spoken out against this practice?
The practice I am referring to is the practice that is mentioned in my comment, i.e. lobbyist from capitalist institutions. Which is involving the government in the economy for the express purpose of the donor class enriching said corporations profit at the expense of the voter class.
You didn’t read my comment and therefore presented your own manipulative strawman rebuttal so that you could present your own bogus narrative of what I said.
If you did this on purpose then your an asshole of course. If you did this by mistake, then I will forgive. But nonetheless, take a class in reading comprehension for the mentally impaired.
No, I read your comments and clearly, you have become emotional about what was really just my thougts/comments based on what you said. If I misuderstood, it may be because you used several different terms that actually have different meanings. If you meant something specific, it was vague and without definitive language – anyone could have made interpretations and some may have been what you intended/meant and some would not. I needed a mind-reading class, not a class in comprehension for the “mentally impaired”.
I pointed the vagueness out and stated clearly I didn’t believe the terms were the same thing: “I don’t see where you mentioned “crony capitalism” until your last comment. You mentioned lobbyists. Then corporate lobbyists. I don’t see how those are the exact same as “crony capitalism”. My reason was because Small business can lobby too and not all lobbying is to get access to tax money and become what Cobbetts quote refers to.
“Donor class” and “voter class” are the same thing? I’ll put aside that the word “class” immediately implies communisim/progressives. I don’t think comprehension (for the “mentally impaired”) would help here, so I’ll just ask: What do you believe the defintions are for each of these made up, identity-politic-groups? Do they ever cross-over with corporations/businesses? Can a corporate share holder vote? Can a voter own shares in a corporation? If so, are they still the donor/voter “class” alone?
I recognized what appeared as a Strawman because anyone who has read Casey knows he has been harping on the exact points you claimed he has never mentioned. He mentions that stuff all the time and has been for years. He actually mentions it in the article we are commenting on which also contradicts the question in your first comment: ““So as Doug Casey says, “The government should not be involved in the economy”, then why hasn’t he EVER spoken out against this practice?”” He has, many times and over years! Also, he is a Libertarian – by default he is against the practice you inaccurately claim he has never spoken out against. That is why it looks like a strawman assertion.
In some ways “capitalism” has become “capitulationism” – in order to conduct life and business, not to mention prosper, in THIS free-market society, one must submit/concede/obey to feed the mouth(s) that bites the hand, but with each passing day, the mouth(s) demands more and more and more- not just income taxes (which are/were supposed to be on “profits”, but somehow that applies to an individual in a time/wage trade) but sales taxes, gas taxes, business taxes of all stripes, property taxes, wheel taxes, miscellaneous (and endless) fees for permits and licenses, duties, et cetera, on state, federal, and local levels; and pretty soon it becomes clear that the mouths are not just biting but EATING the hands that feed them.
And, being rhetorical here . . . regarding the “ALWAYS gets paid first” partner, how is it that they confiscate your money on the front end but if you don’t file a “return” on the back-end, YOU are guilty of a crime? THEY already TOOK what they wanted, so why the charade of “consent”? To me there is no clearer example of creating a criminal from a “productive” citizen.
When governments decide who gets the no-bid contracts, who gets subsidies, who gets buried by onerous regulations (Doofus-Frankenwenie) that insulate “crony capitalists” from competition while removing essential protections (Glass Steagall)…
… it’s no longer capitalism.
It’s Adam’s invisible hand lifting your wallet.
If not for the force of the Government, those same lobbyists would be in the unemployment line, as would their political hand maidens. Similar to the current bid for a Clinton speaking fee – once the force is neutered, so too is the interest of the “capitalists”. I put capitalists in quotes, as just about NO ONE in business today, other than the local small business, is engaged in any real form of capitalism. Today’s cronyism is just climbing on top of the other guy to get to the Government cheese, and get the ear of the guys with the guns before their competition.
I don’t see taxing as a problem. I see government spending as the problem, especially when the governments spend money the government doesn’t have and borrows it. Ohhhh. that is the rub.
If taxes weren’t a problem (at a measly 3%) we’d still be a British colony
Taxes have become a socialist governments lifeline . We as Americans no longer live in a free Constitutional Republic . We now struggle to exist as free citizens yoked and harnessed by force (slavery or indentured servitude) to support government largess . See how well socialism works for those operating the system , as you are taxed directly and indirectly by as much as 50% of everything you earn . You never truly own anything especially property . You rent everything or it is confiscated by armed government agents to pay for their protection and service , neither of which they are legally obligated to do for you . So here we are at the twilights last gleaming financially and morally bankrupted as a nation and the “THEY” at the top of this scam still want more . Fuck em come and take it !
Trust this “THEY” will !
Just doing my job ….see you at the next Nuremberg style trials !