The Off Topic Topic

[Admiral Yi]

Why?

Because you're a pinko.

[Jacob]

I would have figured you for an inheritance tax supporter.

Personally I don't care if there's an inheritance tax or not, as long as there's enough tax revenue for the government to provide a proper welfare system. Whatever combination of inheritance, income and sales tax that doesn't exacerbate social differences is fine.

[Sheilbh]

I would have figured you for an inheritance tax supporter.

Personally I don't care if there's an inheritance tax or not, as long as there's enough tax revenue for the government to provide a proper welfare system. Whatever combination of inheritance, income and sales tax that doesn't exacerbate social differences is fine.

Yep.  To which I'd add that everyone should be paying some taxes - I think it's the other side of a universal welfare system.

[Admiral Yi]

Whatever combination of inheritance, income and sales tax that doesn't exacerbate social differences is fine.

Really??  So you'd be perfectly happy with a flat tax?

I suspect you chose your words poorly or didn't think it through Yakie.

[Sheilbh]

Really??  So you'd be perfectly happy with a flat tax?

I wouldn't have a problem with that - I like flatter, lower taxes on a wider base - as long as it didn't hurt the poor too much.  I think that's probably in Jake's exacerbate social difference point.

[Neil]

Whatever combination of inheritance, income and sales tax that doesn't exacerbate social differences is fine.

Really??  So you'd be perfectly happy with a flat tax?

I suspect you chose your words poorly or didn't think it through Yakie.

Wouldn't a flat tax exacerbate social differences?

[Admiral Yi]

Wouldn't a flat tax exacerbate social differences?

It would be neutral.  A person who had five times the income of another would still have five times the income after a flat tax was implemented.

[mongers]

Really??  So you'd be perfectly happy with a flat tax?

I wouldn't have a problem with that - I like flatter, lower taxes on a wider base - as long as it didn't hurt the poor too much.  I think that's probably in Jake's exacerbate social difference point.

So how much hurt is just about the right amount ?

[Sheilbh]

It would be neutral.  A person who had five times the income of another would still have five times the income after a flat tax was implemented.

It wouldn't be neutral though.  A flat tax anywhere in the Western world would be either unhelpfully high (and so not have the incentive advantages that it possibly has) or it would massive redistribution from lower and middle incomes to the well off.  I believe.  So introducing a flat tax in any Western country - like the US, Canada or the UK - would exacerbate social differences enormously.

It may be different in some transition economies - like the Eastern Euro countries that have gone for it - and maybe some other countries.

Also it would only be as neutral as its society.  If you've a flat tax in a country with very low social mobility then I'd argue that by preserving that income balance it's actually exacerbating social differences.

[Sheilbh]

So how much hurt is just about the right amount ?

So we're all contributing.  Taxes shouldn't be something other people pay any more than the benefits of the state should be something other people receive.

[Admiral Yi]

It wouldn't be neutral though.  A flat tax anywhere in the Western world would be either unhelpfully high (and so not have the incentive advantages that it possibly has) or it would massive redistribution from lower and middle incomes to the well off.  I believe.  So introducing a flat tax in any Western country - like the US, Canada or the UK - would exacerbate social differences enormously.

If we take, as you have done, the starting point of our existing progressive tax systems then this is true, but it also renders Jake's statement kind of meaningless.

[mongers]

So how much hurt is just about the right amount ?

So we're all contributing.  Taxes shouldn't be something other people pay any more than the benefits of the state should be something other people receive.

Everyone pays taxes in the UK.

And since you were advocating a significant change in tax policy I was interested to know just how much extra 'hurt' you thought would be appropriate.

[Neil]

Wouldn't a flat tax exacerbate social differences?

It would be neutral.  A person who had five times the income of another would still have five times the income after a flat tax was implemented.

But since the costs of the basic necessities of life remain immutable, a flat tax high enough to pay for the modern state would destroy people.

[Tonitrus]

It's like when then increase our military pay by a flat percentage rate, though in reverse.  The gap between officers and enlisted only gets larger. 

[Sheilbh]

Everyone pays taxes in the UK.

And since you were advocating a significant change in tax policy I was interested to know just how much extra 'hurt' you thought would be appropriate.

I mean income tax. 

I'm not advocating any shift, I don't think.  My view on taxes is generally that they should be low on a broad base.  So, in terms of practical policy, I'm not sure about raising the personal allowance to £10 000, and I think raising it to a minimum wage would be a mistake too.

If we take, as you have done, the starting point of our existing progressive tax systems then this is true, but it also renders Jake's statement kind of meaningless.

But what's the point if you don't take the existing world as a starting point?  There's lots of things I'd support or oppose in an abstract world that I don't in the real world. Surely that's more meaningless?

I took Jake to be saying he's not ideologically wed to any specific type of taxes, if the state's paid and the social differences aren't exacerbated.  In the practical example of inheritance tax that's been done.  In your example of a flat tax it's difficult to see how practically that could be done. 

So I don't know about Jake, but I'm not ideologically opposed to either - in a pure theoretical world - but in practice one's possible and the other's not.