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taxation

Modern-day government is a scam

Anglosphere

If you drink and smoke like me, your tax burden probably increased again yesterday due to the increase of excise on alcohol and tobacco. Happy new year! Income taxes, sales taxes (or VAT), excise, import duties.. there aren't many countries left where the total tax burden of a person is less than 50%.

Don't get me wrong, taxes are a necessity. They are required for government and I wouldn't like anarchy much better. But how much government do we really need? Why do we have to work at least six months a year just to pay for government? Why does, for every hour of hard work, the government gets as many pennies, dollar/euro cents, yens or yuans as the one doing the actual work, if not more?

The government gets more money than the combined working class (lower, middle and upper combined) for their work. For every man or woman with a job, there should in theory be a dedicated aide to provide health care, education and security. Then why do I pay my own insurance fee for the first, why did I pay tuition for the second and why does the local pub have to hire a bouncer for the last?

Government should be much smaller than it is. At least twice as small, maybe even by a factor of ten. Lower taxes. I'm sick of working half my life just to support some entity telling me what (not) to do.

Income from aviation? EasyTax!

European Union

The European Union does not have the power to levy taxes, but don't blame that on lack of trying. Here's a new EU proposal on air taxes:

Parliament is discussing the proposals, contained in a report, as Europeans queue up at airports to fly off on holiday.

The report recommends that the airline industry's exemption from paying Value Added Tax (VAT) on fuel should be scrapped, and says an additional fuel tax should be brought in. It would apply around the world.

I'm worried.

Removing existing tax exemptions does not worry me so much. In reality the proverbial exception to the rule means nothing but more rules and more complex rules, in other words bureaucracy. Of course, compared to sales tax, VAT itself is very bureaucratic, but the removal of exemptions would at least make more transparent to deal with VAT.

However.. historically governments have been inept to even make an estimation of the economical costs of their actions. Let alone a worthful comparision of costs to actual benefits (in this case environmental). The EU in particular is not known for transparency nor efficiency, so there would be no way to verify that the extra tax revenue would actually be invested in the environment. It is far more likely extra taxes would primarily assist the continuous relative growth of government budget compared to GDP.

Last but not least: raise your hand if you agree that the European Union should not have the capability, ambition, desire and sheer arrogance to talk about levying taxes that "would apply around the world".

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