Post
Topic
Board Economics
Re: why do people agree to pay taxes?
by
cameronpalte
on 21/02/2015, 23:06:59 UTC
Paying taxes is part of a social contract.  I pay taxes and expect several things in return: security and an ever improving way of life, basically.  I had a neighbor that used to complain of paying taxes when the money went to schools and programs for school children.  I could have made the same complaint but you have to think about what that money is doing.  Putting kids through school enables adults to spend more time in the work force.  It educates children.  That's pretty much it.  I mean, that's just one example of many but you get the idea.  Also think about when new technologies such as the internet come along.  The internet is a new attack vector for pedophiles so you need law enforcement to handle it and that costs money.  

Why is it so hard to understand that libertarians are not against paying for services, just against paying by compulsion ?
Let me pay for my school. Let me decide if my child need schools at all.

A contract assume two consenting person. But if you don't consent, you go to jail. This is not what I call a contract.

And you misunderstand what social contract is - social contract is you pay because you expect things from the society.

Let's say you live in a country with 100 million people. You may use more than your 1/100 million share of the roads. But may not have kids in school. What social contract does is it keeps you from saying I don't want to pay for school but then not paying extra to use the roads more.


You are right a contract assumes two consenting people and that is what government does - you don't go to jail if you don't consent you go to jail if you break the law. And the law states that if you want to be a citizen and live in the U.S. you have to pay taxes. You don't have to pay taxes in the U.S. but you can't choose to live in the U.S., be its citizen and receive those advantages without paying taxes.