Lowering Taxes is Moral

**tsuke** · 04-28-2017, 09:33 AM

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https://tsukesthoughts.wordpress.com...axes-is-moral/

Lowering Taxes is Moral

President Trump has come out with his proposal regarding corporate taxes. He wants to lower it to 15% while closing all the loopholes. There will be a lot of discussion on both sides on the effectivity of this act. One side will say that it will generate new business and the other will say there is no use to it and it is a payoff to the rich. Neither side will discuss the morality of the act.

Lowering corporate taxes is the only moral choice in this scenario. As it stands right now our corporate taxes are 35-39%. It varies slightly depending on the actual state you are in. The amazing thing about this rate is that when you ask any politician whether they are from the right like Ted Cruz or from the left like Bernie Sanders they will all say the same thing. Corporations do not pay this as it is. They pay an average of 15% to 20%. Some corporations pay lower and some higher depending on how aggressively they are willing to exploit loopholes and the talent of their lawyers and accountants. There is a consensus that if corporation were to actually pay this tax rate which is the highest in the world they would leave or go under. We are in effect operating under laws we expect no one to follow.

Laws

Since I am discussing morality it will be useful to first discuss what a law is. A politician will give you one answer, a law student will give you another, and a layman will give you a third. The best description I have found comes from a thinker in the Qin dynasty. A law is a wish. It is the physical incarnation of the ideal society of the lawmaker. In simple terms if you make laws penalizing rape and murder it is because you do not want rape and murder in your society. If you make laws protecting dolphins it is because you want the environment and that animal protected. If you make laws attracting business it is because you want your people employed. The laws you make define the type of society to live in. If you make laws that you expect people to break then you get a society of lawbreakers.

Should be Followed

Ayn Rand got a lot of things wrong in her philosophy but one of the things she got absolutely correct is that the most evil thing you can do is to design laws so people have no choice but to break them. Once you do that you have turned your entire society into criminals and have control over them. Take the tax rate for example. If you have a group of moral companies who paid the 39% as mandated by law and another group of companies who cheated and paid only 15% the companies who made the moral choice would cease to exist. What is worse the officials tasked with enforcing the law would not care as no one expected the law to be followed anyway.

Once you have created your society of lawbreakers then all the power rests in the hands of those who enforce and make the laws as opposed to the citizens. Your success or failure does not depend on the skill of labor or management but on the grace of the officials who choose which laws they would like to enforce. After all the easiest way to actually kill your company would be to enforce the laws that are already there. You have basically institutionalized corruption.

The Moral Choice

Laws should be made with the expectation that they be followed. If you want companies to pay 40% tax then make then declare that they will pay 40% tax. If you want them to pay 100% tax then make a law that compels them to do it. If your system does anything else then it must be changed.

**Lightbringer** · 04-28-2017, 08:41 PM

Originally Posted by tsuke

images (2).jpg

https://tsukesthoughts.wordpress.com...axes-is-moral/

Lowering Taxes is Moral

President Trump has come out with his proposal regarding corporate taxes. He wants to lower it to 15% while closing all the loopholes. There will be a lot of discussion on both sides on the effectivity of this act. One side will say that it will generate new business and the other will say there is no use to it and it is a payoff to the rich. Neither side will discuss the morality of the act.

Lowering corporate taxes is the only moral choice in this scenario. As it stands right now our corporate taxes are 35-39%. It varies slightly depending on the actual state you are in. The amazing thing about this rate is that when you ask any politician whether they are from the right like Ted Cruz or from the left like Bernie Sanders they will all say the same thing. Corporations do not pay this as it is. They pay an average of 15% to 20%. Some corporations pay lower and some higher depending on how aggressively they are willing to exploit loopholes and the talent of their lawyers and accountants. There is a consensus that if corporation were to actually pay this tax rate which is the highest in the world they would leave or go under. We are in effect operating under laws we expect no one to follow.

Laws

Since I am discussing morality it will be useful to first discuss what a law is. A politician will give you one answer, a law student will give you another, and a layman will give you a third. The best description I have found comes from a thinker in the Qin dynasty. A law is a wish. It is the physical incarnation of the ideal society of the lawmaker. In simple terms if you make laws penalizing rape and murder it is because you do not want rape and murder in your society. If you make laws protecting dolphins it is because you want the environment and that animal protected. If you make laws attracting business it is because you want your people employed. The laws you make define the type of society to live in. If you make laws that you expect people to break then you get a society of lawbreakers.

Should be Followed

Ayn Rand got a lot of things wrong in her philosophy but one of the things she got absolutely correct is that the most evil thing you can do is to design laws so people have no choice but to break them. Once you do that you have turned your entire society into criminals and have control over them. Take the tax rate for example. If you have a group of moral companies who paid the 39% as mandated by law and another group of companies who cheated and paid only 15% the companies who made the moral choice would cease to exist. What is worse the officials tasked with enforcing the law would not care as no one expected the law to be followed anyway.

Once you have created your society of lawbreakers then all the power rests in the hands of those who enforce and make the laws as opposed to the citizens. Your success or failure does not depend on the skill of labor or management but on the grace of the officials who choose which laws they would like to enforce. After all the easiest way to actually kill your company would be to enforce the laws that are already there. You have basically institutionalized corruption.

The Moral Choice

Laws should be made with the expectation that they be followed. If you want companies to pay 40% tax then make then declare that they will pay 40% tax. If you want them to pay 100% tax then make a law that compels them to do it. If your system does anything else then it must be changed.

Why is a 15% corporate rate any better than 35%? Or 50%? Or 20%

I don't think the issue is the rate. C-Corp shouldn't be taxed at all. The only thing the corporate tax rate does is allow their owners to evade personal tax issues S-Corp owners have to deal with.

**Bill** · 04-28-2017, 10:03 PM

Oddly there is no mention of debt.???

**FUCK THE POLICE** · 04-28-2017, 10:05 PM

RAISE TAXES

SOAK THE RICH

**FUCK THE POLICE** · 04-28-2017, 10:06 PM

Something that is not enforced is not inherently really a law. There is no contradiction.

**FUCK THE POLICE** · 04-28-2017, 10:08 PM

The best description I have found comes from a thinker in the Qin dynasty

Wow, quoting straight from the first totalitarian society in history. I'm sure the rest of this is going to be good.

**tsuke** · 04-29-2017, 04:03 AM

Originally Posted by Mitsuha Miyamizu

Something that is not enforced is not inherently really a law. There is no contradiction.

thats kinda my point. If you dont plan to enforce it it should not be a law. Otherwise you have the option to selectively enforce it which institutionalizes corruption.

**tsuke** · 04-29-2017, 04:03 AM

Originally Posted by Bill

Oddly there is no mention of debt.???

i dont really care about it. I place america in the too big to fail category.

**Bill** · 04-29-2017, 05:59 PM

Originally Posted by tsuke

i dont really care about it. I place america in the too big to fail category.

You don't care about debt?? Did you care about it when Obama was President of the USA??

**tsuke** · 04-29-2017, 06:00 PM

Originally Posted by Bill

You don't care about debt?? Did you care about it when Obama was President of the USA??

not really again if the us collapses the rest of the world does too. too big to fail

**Bill** · 04-29-2017, 06:07 PM

Originally Posted by tsuke

not really again if the us collapses the rest of the world does too. too big to fail

Oh, the rest of the world collapses to, how comforting.......

**Lightbringer** · 04-29-2017, 06:31 PM

Originally Posted by tsuke

i dont really care about it. I place america in the too big to fail category.

Who bails America out?

**Mott the Hoople** · 04-30-2017, 04:16 AM

What a crock. The GOP pulls the same bullshit over and over. They cut taxes and increase spending on the insane delusion that has never ever, ever happened that the economic stimulus of tax cuts will pay for them spending money like drunken sailors.

**Mott the Hoople** · 04-30-2017, 04:21 AM

Reagan did it and revenues fell and had to raise taxes. Bush 1 did the same. Bush 2 cut taxes and turned surpluses into deficits, now Trump is talking more supply side shit and guess what? It won't work either cause supply side voodoo economics doesn't work. Never has, never will.

**PostmodernProphet** · 04-30-2017, 05:33 AM

Originally Posted by Mott the Hoople

Reagan did it and revenues fell and had to raise taxes. Bush 1 did the same. Bush 2 cut taxes and turned surpluses into deficits, now Trump is talking more supply side shit and guess what? It won't work either cause supply side voodoo economics doesn't work. Never has, never will.

Revenues were intended to fall.....the failure lands on the face of Tip who didn't follow up with the accompanying cut in spending.....the only reason supply side economics didn't work as intended is that Demmycrat never intended....