Thanks Alex, so true. What a sad, sorry state we are in!! It is likely once again only fear which keeps us from taking appropriate steps! If only we'd remember the refrain of the song that was heard on the streets of London about 3-4 years ago :
"we are the 99%!"
Keep going, you write so eloquently, expressing thoughts I couldn't make clear!
Thank you for all the research and time you spend on your excellent articles.
Regarding taxation, I think most of us are incurious and illiterate, largely owing to the complexity and opacity of taxation systems in most countries. Indeed, we have very little say in how the money is spent.
I, too, would like answers. I think wholesale and widespread incompetence and/or corruption may account for the missing billions or trillions. It's possible that if this missing money was accounted for, there would be a huge public outcry, so huge as to damage a government. Alex, I'll give your questions thought, but I think the system, in so-called democracies at least, is a great big swindle. Ministers and other officials go on public funded holidays, thinly disguised as meetings, in plush accommodation. Private aircraft are often used for these jolly occasions, in spite of net zero. They also get many freebies, don't they, Mr. Starmer and friends!
When it comes to trust, I have absolutely no trust in any government department or large corporate entity, including large charities. With your choir, being small, local, and hopefully transparent, it can be trusted. This applies to local charities in general if they're worth their salt.
Unfortunately I lack the courage to refuse to pay taxes.
Thanks for this excellent piece, so clearly expressed. The historical factors are interesting, I had just accepted the inevitability of taxes and hadn't really thought about every way we are taxed, it's quite an astoundingly long list.
The second home tax in Wales is pretty damaging. It might free up homes but they are too expensive for local people generally. There are 40 properties on the market in our area of 1750 people. There are penalties if you can't sell in a time frame. If you rent them out you have all the issues associated with being a landlord, as all landlords are assumed to be unscrupulous. Selling off of council housing under Thatchers 'right to buy' scheme and not replacing it with anything remotely similar has been the biggest disaster on the housing front.
Thanks for raising my awareness.
There was some success getting the 'Poll Tax' changed due to the power of the people.
The second home tax in Wales is an example of taxation with unintended consequences that has destructive effects rather than addressing the problem it was introduced to solve. It sounds much more like a kind of punishment for those who aren't doing things the way the authorities would like. As such, you could call it taxation-as-abuse! There are numerous examples of this now, and we'd all be much better at seeing them if we were more tax-literate.
Tax was never destined to properly serve the collective-pot-for-shared-services ethos. To the extent that it does, it's accidental. This is because, as you point out, taxes were born in iniquity (war) and things have only got worse. Tax is also intimately linked to the banking / money creation fraud. The government raises debt to fund expenditure that goes to the corporatocracy - think £37bn for track and trace and God knows how many billions on 'vaccines'. The interest on that debt then goes to banks and is paid for by the taxpayer so it's a double whammy.
Tax is ultimately an efficient means of wealth transfer from the poor to the rich. And remember the rich, including multinational corporates, don't pay tax or, if they do, it's a token amount. Tax is the means by which we pay for our demise.
The tax strike would be a way forward...but united we stand and divided we fall. Even if you could get enough people on board, how do you tell an employer not to deduct PAYE? The bastards have put up a very effective barrier to a tax strike by collecting at source - essentially not giving you a choice. Which is exactly what you'd do if you knew that the money you were taking was not going to be used for the purpose taxpayers want it to be used.
You're right, and I chose not to include a bit about wealth transfer in the interests of keeping the piece reasonably short. It also occurs that tax-as-war-money is a form of protection money, along the lines of: "you pay us the costs of fighting our (the tribal leaders') enemies and we'll allow you to live on this land".
I don't know what the way forward is, but I think change will only come as part of change to the whole "democratic" system. And it will come, however painfully and however long it takes, because you can't keeping extracting, extracting from a population endlessly.
You put alot of time into these pieces you do and its appreciated. Quite a journey for you these last four years. I have for many years now said to people why do they need to tax us if they can just create currency whenever needed. The fractional reserve fiat currency is a system is a ponzi scheme. creating debt to pay off debt. More Tax more war is unfortunately their way. Thanks for you research
Alex, really happy to read your post and I'm particular the line of questioning and the changes in perspective.
Some answers to your questions:
Are taxes consistent with the role of the state in a democracy? What areas of national life needed to be funded by taxation? What do not? Do the taxes in place have the genuine consent of most people?
These questions go back to what is the role of the state and what authority we have that we can delegate. From all of my study, the only thing we can delegate are our natural rights to defend our lives, liberty and property. And so the role of a government is only the common defence of life, liberty and property which I translate to military, police and judiciary as the only areas taxes can be consistent if they apply equally to all people. Taxes are after extracted by state coercion and are not voluntary and by the consent of people. If there was consent you don't need to criminalise tax evasion or need a tax collection agency.
I would very much recommend the following if you haven't come across them already:
Excellent article. In my opinion we should be able to choose how we spend our money. For my part I do not want to fund war and I do not want a nanny state to tell me how I should live. I suggest we all look at ways to reduce the amount of tax we pay. I'd love to hear ideas about how to do that. My initial thought is to not pay the TV licence (can that be called a tax?). There are restaurants where I know of which only accept cash. I suspect that that might be a way for them to reduce the amount of tax they pay. But for those of us who have tax deducted at source, I am at a loss.
The TV licence is called a tax but it is an optional one considering that you are not supposed to pay it if you do not watch TV. Since 2022 I've been paying cash everywhere as a matter of course and do not give card-only establishments my custom.
These things, as it turns out, are quite easy to do.
But what about the huge amounts we are all paying in VAT and other automatically levied taxes? Understandable that you are at a loss because there we are at the point where something radical has to be done or, willingly or not, enter a phase where an unsustainable situation leads to some kind of collapse.
AUTHOR'S UPDATE: I regret to note that, following the Budget, the UK now has its highest levels of tax ever, exceeding even those during and following World War II.
Thanks Alex, so true. What a sad, sorry state we are in!! It is likely once again only fear which keeps us from taking appropriate steps! If only we'd remember the refrain of the song that was heard on the streets of London about 3-4 years ago :
"we are the 99%!"
Keep going, you write so eloquently, expressing thoughts I couldn't make clear!
Thank you for all the research and time you spend on your excellent articles.
Regarding taxation, I think most of us are incurious and illiterate, largely owing to the complexity and opacity of taxation systems in most countries. Indeed, we have very little say in how the money is spent.
I, too, would like answers. I think wholesale and widespread incompetence and/or corruption may account for the missing billions or trillions. It's possible that if this missing money was accounted for, there would be a huge public outcry, so huge as to damage a government. Alex, I'll give your questions thought, but I think the system, in so-called democracies at least, is a great big swindle. Ministers and other officials go on public funded holidays, thinly disguised as meetings, in plush accommodation. Private aircraft are often used for these jolly occasions, in spite of net zero. They also get many freebies, don't they, Mr. Starmer and friends!
When it comes to trust, I have absolutely no trust in any government department or large corporate entity, including large charities. With your choir, being small, local, and hopefully transparent, it can be trusted. This applies to local charities in general if they're worth their salt.
Unfortunately I lack the courage to refuse to pay taxes.
Thanks for this excellent piece, so clearly expressed. The historical factors are interesting, I had just accepted the inevitability of taxes and hadn't really thought about every way we are taxed, it's quite an astoundingly long list.
The second home tax in Wales is pretty damaging. It might free up homes but they are too expensive for local people generally. There are 40 properties on the market in our area of 1750 people. There are penalties if you can't sell in a time frame. If you rent them out you have all the issues associated with being a landlord, as all landlords are assumed to be unscrupulous. Selling off of council housing under Thatchers 'right to buy' scheme and not replacing it with anything remotely similar has been the biggest disaster on the housing front.
Thanks for raising my awareness.
There was some success getting the 'Poll Tax' changed due to the power of the people.
The second home tax in Wales is an example of taxation with unintended consequences that has destructive effects rather than addressing the problem it was introduced to solve. It sounds much more like a kind of punishment for those who aren't doing things the way the authorities would like. As such, you could call it taxation-as-abuse! There are numerous examples of this now, and we'd all be much better at seeing them if we were more tax-literate.
Tax was never destined to properly serve the collective-pot-for-shared-services ethos. To the extent that it does, it's accidental. This is because, as you point out, taxes were born in iniquity (war) and things have only got worse. Tax is also intimately linked to the banking / money creation fraud. The government raises debt to fund expenditure that goes to the corporatocracy - think £37bn for track and trace and God knows how many billions on 'vaccines'. The interest on that debt then goes to banks and is paid for by the taxpayer so it's a double whammy.
Tax is ultimately an efficient means of wealth transfer from the poor to the rich. And remember the rich, including multinational corporates, don't pay tax or, if they do, it's a token amount. Tax is the means by which we pay for our demise.
The tax strike would be a way forward...but united we stand and divided we fall. Even if you could get enough people on board, how do you tell an employer not to deduct PAYE? The bastards have put up a very effective barrier to a tax strike by collecting at source - essentially not giving you a choice. Which is exactly what you'd do if you knew that the money you were taking was not going to be used for the purpose taxpayers want it to be used.
Let's face it, 95% of tax really is just theft.
You're right, and I chose not to include a bit about wealth transfer in the interests of keeping the piece reasonably short. It also occurs that tax-as-war-money is a form of protection money, along the lines of: "you pay us the costs of fighting our (the tribal leaders') enemies and we'll allow you to live on this land".
I don't know what the way forward is, but I think change will only come as part of change to the whole "democratic" system. And it will come, however painfully and however long it takes, because you can't keeping extracting, extracting from a population endlessly.
You put alot of time into these pieces you do and its appreciated. Quite a journey for you these last four years. I have for many years now said to people why do they need to tax us if they can just create currency whenever needed. The fractional reserve fiat currency is a system is a ponzi scheme. creating debt to pay off debt. More Tax more war is unfortunately their way. Thanks for you research
Alex, really happy to read your post and I'm particular the line of questioning and the changes in perspective.
Some answers to your questions:
Are taxes consistent with the role of the state in a democracy? What areas of national life needed to be funded by taxation? What do not? Do the taxes in place have the genuine consent of most people?
These questions go back to what is the role of the state and what authority we have that we can delegate. From all of my study, the only thing we can delegate are our natural rights to defend our lives, liberty and property. And so the role of a government is only the common defence of life, liberty and property which I translate to military, police and judiciary as the only areas taxes can be consistent if they apply equally to all people. Taxes are after extracted by state coercion and are not voluntary and by the consent of people. If there was consent you don't need to criminalise tax evasion or need a tax collection agency.
I would very much recommend the following if you haven't come across them already:
The Law by Frederic Bastiat - https://libertas.org/books/the_law.pdf
Supply side economics course - https://online.hillsdale.edu/courses/promo/supply-side-economics
Julius Ruechel on how we think about wealth - https://www.juliusruechel.com/2021/01/squirrels-acorns-and-wealth-of-nations.html?m=1
Pendulum Balance - https://www.pendulumbalance.com/
Thanks Jilian - I'll take a look at those.
Seems the link for the law is dead. This was really foundational for me. Here's another one. https://CDN.mises.org/thelaw.pdf
Excellent article. In my opinion we should be able to choose how we spend our money. For my part I do not want to fund war and I do not want a nanny state to tell me how I should live. I suggest we all look at ways to reduce the amount of tax we pay. I'd love to hear ideas about how to do that. My initial thought is to not pay the TV licence (can that be called a tax?). There are restaurants where I know of which only accept cash. I suspect that that might be a way for them to reduce the amount of tax they pay. But for those of us who have tax deducted at source, I am at a loss.
The TV licence is called a tax but it is an optional one considering that you are not supposed to pay it if you do not watch TV. Since 2022 I've been paying cash everywhere as a matter of course and do not give card-only establishments my custom.
These things, as it turns out, are quite easy to do.
But what about the huge amounts we are all paying in VAT and other automatically levied taxes? Understandable that you are at a loss because there we are at the point where something radical has to be done or, willingly or not, enter a phase where an unsustainable situation leads to some kind of collapse.
AUTHOR'S UPDATE: I regret to note that, following the Budget, the UK now has its highest levels of tax ever, exceeding even those during and following World War II.