I feel like I'm in crazytown when I express distress about taxation - literally people forcibly taking away your property - and ppl act like I'm the crazy one. Sure, you could argue that this forcible theft is worth it, and I'll respect that, but it's still not crazy to be upset.
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I don’t think it’s unreasonable to be distressed, at all. Taxes are a capricious and arbitrary use of power, the rational response should be fear and anger. There is no mechanism to consent to an income tax.
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Right, thank you <3
Another problem is, I would love to "opt out" as much as I can - I wanna run away to some woods and stop paying most taxes or taking electricity from the grid, but I also can't do this. They give you no escape.
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Taxes are consented to by “we” as a collective, but probably not you or I as individuals.
I think the nature of the distress is understandable, but if this is “force” then so is literally every act of government.
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I do think most things government does are in fact force and should not be done
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So you'd rather privatize public infrastructure and pay a street toll every time you walk outside your apartment?
Do you think that would actually work out if everyone pays the same and either poor people cannot leave the house anymore or nobody pays enough to maintain it?
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I think you're failing to model actual incentives in this world. 1. likely building this stuff would be cheaper without government being influenced by corporate money
2. paying a street toll every time is inefficient/there's other methods
3. poor people still make roads elsewhere
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Think of it as paying for the infrastructure and society that allowed you to make that money. It may hurt, but it's a fair trade IMO.
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I'm okay with fair trades, I'm not okay with nonconsensual trades. My issue here is that it is *my* property taken *by force*, and people are trying to tell me "cheer up, it's a fair trade." I don't care if it's fair, it's still a violation.
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No, the US would still tax me even if I never stepped foot in the US again.
I would have to renounce my US citizenship.
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